; jade GREEN HEROES

Ragpickers or
city savers?
From the NGO Acorn grows this vast oak tree of solace and respectability for
hundreds of ragpickers of Dharavi, Mumbai handling the city’s toxic waste.
Sugatha Menon meets Vinod Shetty, the man behind Acorn

134 I june 2010

 Vinod Shetty is the founder of NGO
Acorn which stands strong and proud
on four R’s. Reduce, Recycle, Reuse
and Respect. Yes, respect for the
ragpickers who are the one of the main
instruments in the process of recycling
of the city’s dumps. According to Vinod,
“Mumbai generates 10,000 tonnes of
waste, if it were not for the ragpickers
who pick, segregate and recycle this
waste, the whole of Mumbai would have
been one dumpyard!” Commendable
work, but kachra is a bad word in our
inod Shetty is the society and anyone dealing in it is
kind of person looked down upon, and this is where
you wish you were! the fourth R of respect for Acorn’s
He is doing what ragpickers comes from. A majority of
you wished you were the ragpickers are from Dharavi, after
doing…only you lack spending the entire day combing the
his commitment and city’s filthiest spots to gather waste, they
passion for a cause and all congregate at Dharavi, where the
that’s what separates us world’s largest recycling unit is located
ordinary beings who only and where 80 per cent of the dry waste
think of doing something is reused.
for the underprivileged from the
extraordinary people who put their Environment protectors
money, time and life where their Vinod is an advocate by profession who
heart is! runs Acorn for almost two years now.

vinod shetty at an acorn event

photograph: vikram adige

june 2010 I 135

; jade green heroes
This foundation trains the ragpickers in
scientific methods of waste handling,
segregation and recycling. Vinod who
has been an activist for more than
25 years took up the cause of the
ragpickers as a challenge as he felt that
this section of our society is otherwise
invisible as they do not feature in
surveys and statistics. He observed,
“While studying the ragpickers I realized
that they were the poorest of the poor
both in terms of economic strata as well
as they were mainly dalits and Muslims,
a large population were women and
children, hence I decided that this was
the section to work for as they belonged
to the unorganized sector.”
He has started a project called
Dharavi Project, where all the ragpickers
are members of the project and are
given identity cards. They are involved
in waste awareness programmes
and are also partnering with schools
in waste management. Says Vinod,
“Since rag pickers don’t use the AC,
nor drink mineral water, nor drive SUVs,
the environmental problem is ours,
not theirs. We are trying to create an
136 I june 2010
interactive bond between the ragpickers
and school students.”
On the agenda
What’s on the agenda of demands from
Acorn for the ragpickers? “We want
to highlight their contribution to the
environment. The government should
set up a board whereby polluters pay a
cess of about one per cent which can go
towards giving the ragpickers a proper
income with safety equipment like gloves
and other amenities. They should be
trained in handling toxic waste and have
expertise in recycling goods in a non
hazardous way.”
Making it easier
After spending the entire day collecting
waste from the city’s dumps, the
ragpickers finally come to the Acorn
office space, where they are given
informal education in music, photography
and other arts. Many eminent artists
like Shankar Mahadevan, Sunita Rao,
Apache Indian and Katrina Kaif have
participated in such programmes.
Recently Boxettes the girl band from
the us ambassador to india visits acorn’s
waste center
UK had a delightful music workshop
for them. The Boxettes performance
was the first of a 6-day event, Dharavi
Rocks series which aims at bringing the
ragpicker community into contact with
some of the top international musicians
and celebrities who visit Mumbai. Vinod
has the last word when he says, “ The
quality of any democracy is the manner
in which we treat our poor. If we want to
be a global city we as a civil society will
have to set up systems to take care of
the vulnerable sections of the society.”
As I write this story, a message pops
in my mailbox, the US ambassador
to India is visiting Acorn’s waste
segregation center today… paucity of
time doesn’t permit me to go for the
event, but I sincerely wish for many more
mighty oaks for this Acorn.