In an era of comforts , laziness has been the offshoot which tends to develop a mindset for keeping ‘light’ while shopping as carrying a bag from home is considered as an inconvenience . This mindset plus the sense of ridding oneself of the botheration of carrying the bag from home paves the way for use of the villainous polythene bags is a simple and ordinary but factual analysis of why polythene bags are not discontinued to give some ‘relief’ to the choked environment. If the report by the United Nations is any indicator, it must frighten us as more than one million (ten lac) polythene bags are “consumed” every minute in the world. Just imagine the volume per hour and per day and then their disposal in no absolute terms. An abstract hard core businessman might find the business lucrative but for an environmentalist there could be no worst news of how environment was being violated and not only the present generation but the future ones rendered susceptible to multiple hazards so much as to grossly jeopardize their existence.
We must give all credit to a developing country like Bangladesh to impose a total ban on polythene bags as back as in 2002 but a see saw like situation is still there between opponents and proponents of the use of the polythene bags and even after 16 long years of ‘thinking’ the world has not emerged as one unified force to say NO to polythene bags and ban it completely. For the time being, therefore commerce has won and environment and general health and healthy life of the people have taken a back seat and continue to be subdued. Who would rue and cry except the man for its doom at its own hands by using this soft but hardest enemy of his or her very existence.
However, there is a vast sections having courageous hearts to go the whole hog against this menace which vindicates the World Environment Day 2018 having been bestowed with the theme of ‘Beat Plastic Pollution’ and we, in our country too have legislated against its use but only in a few States , there are restrictions on its use. Though Jammu and Kashmir too is one such State where there is a “blanket ban ” on the use of these bags but the same is confined only to administrative orders or written in statute books and every shopkeeper and every consumer , with rare exceptions, use and carry these bags with impunity but with momentary pleasure .What havoc its non disposal can create is seen from the fate of our Ranbir Canal, River Tawi and other places while scores of JMC vehicles are daily seen carrying heaps of these bags from different localities and streets daily for dumping somewhere but not for any permanent disposal while these bags continue to be used and just “thrown out” of homes , offices and other places.
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