School kids become messengers of Delhi 2010’s Green theme as OC celebrates the Earth Day

School kids become messengers of Delhi 2010’s Green theme as OC celebrates the Earth Day

NEW DELHI, 22 April 2010: On the occasion of the Earth Day, the Organising Committee Commonwealth Games 2010 Delhi organised “Waste to Craft” Competition with participation 107 students from 27 eco-clubs schools, forming 42 teams, from across the Delhi National Capital Region.

The event gave wings to the imagination of school kids and they enthusiastically crafted different creative items from the waste. All crafted items had an underlying green theme. In his message to the kids, OC CWG Delhi 2010 chairman Mr. Suresh Kalmadi, MP said, “The Organising Committee Commonwealth Games 2010 Delhi is totally committed to its vision of making it the first ever Green Commonwealth Games. Our vision is to strive towards reducing the carbon footprint and become a benchmark for all mutli-disciplinary Games in the future.” He also gave the slogan of - pedh hai to sher hai, pedh hai to shehar hai aur pedh hai to Shera hai – underling the importance of trees.

The competition was held between 10 AM to 1 PM at the OC CWG Delhi 2010 headquarters saw encouraging response from children as all of them worked hard to impress the judges. The main objective of the competition was to sensitise young children on the importance of natural resources and waste minimisation and to promote the cause of Green Games. The event was successful in its endeavour as students echoed similar sentiments. Rishabh Sharma, who also won second prize for his creative craft, from Modern School said, “This is an extremely good step to promote re-use of the waste into useful articles. Moreover, we have been encouraged not to pollute our mother Earth and remake eco-friendly goods instead of wasting them.”

Archana Anand, another participant from Delhi Tamil Education Association School, Mandir Marg supported Delhi 2010’s Green theme and appealed Delhiites to make the city clean. She said, “Commonwealth Games is about uniting people from different countries together and make India proud. I request people of Delhi to keep their neighbourhood and the city neat and clean so that the visitors from different countries feel pleased and help in spreading Delhi’s image around the world.”

The winners of the competition were announced later in the day at the Delhi Secretariat Auditorium. The ceremony included a prize distribution function for the winners and had the esteemed presence of the Chief Minister of Delhi, Smt. Sheila Dikshit; Secretary of Delhi, Mr. Rakesh Mehta; Secretary, Department of Environment, Mr. Dharmendra along with other dignitaries.

The winners were:

First Prize – Pooja, Neha, Sneha and Babita from Sarvodhya Kanya Vidhyalya, West Patel Nagar

Second Prize – Rishabh Arora from Modern School, Barakhamba Road

Third Prize – Siddhi Gupta, Mehak Sodhi, Harnoor Makkar and Tanvi Raina from Convent of Jesus and Mary, Bangla Sahib Marg

Apart from this five other teams won consolation prizes.