Speak Up for a Clean Mumbai!

My friends say that I am a very calm and patient person and I agree with them! But whenever I see someone littering the roads by spitting or throwing empty bottles, wrappers etc, I feel outraged. .In spite of a strong desire to do something about this, nine out of ten times I let it go without a reaction because we have been brought up to believe that in Mumbai people are supposed to mind their own business.

I was traveling in an auto rickshaw from Bandra Hill Road to Bandra Station. Although it is a short stretch , it is generally jam packed and the vehicles move at a slow speed waiting for the signal to turn green. While I was also waiting thus, I noticed a car just in front of me (I don’t remember the make but it was a big car) full of a bunch of young college boys talking in loud voices and generally having fun, Suddenly one of them lowered the glass of the window and threw three empty Pepsi bottles and wrappers of lays, biscuits etc out of the window. The meek or the complacent part of me asked me to ignore what I had seen but the other side of me coaxed me to act…..and act I did before the signal could turn green.
I asked the auto rickshaw driver to go ahead so that we were besides the car. The poor fellow managed to skillfully dodge through the vehicles. I knocked at the window of the car. The boy who had thrown the stuff ignored me. I don’t know if I am right but I thought that he looked guilty and probably did not like the expression on my face and guessed the reason for my knocking the window. However, his friends coaxed him to open the window after I tapped the second time. I tried to remain as calm as I could and simply asked ‘Is this the place to throw this garbage?’ The boy hurriedly apologized and pulled up his window after which I noticed that there was pin drop silence in the car. The boys who were enjoying themselves just a few moments ago were absolutely quiet. Just then the signal turned green and we were off on our respective routes.
That was all that I could do. But when I sit back to think of the repercussions that this incident would have had, I can say that all boys in the car will definitely think twice before littering in a public place the next time . Then the people who witnessed the incident (especially the auto rickshaw driver, the driver of the car, few people walking on the road etc) also learnt a lesson incidentally.
I appeal to all those who read my blog “Please speak up!!!Let’s have a clean Mumbai”