Mr clean: Afroz Shah at the Versova beach. (Photo: Aishwarya Maheshwari)
Some distance from the Versova Jetty, where the beach slopes down towards the sea, a group of people, hands protected by latex gloves, is picking up the trash that the Arabian Sea has belched out. These are the Versova Residents’ Volunteers, who shot to prominence last year for the world’s “biggest” beach clean-up. The breeze has stilled and it is hot and humid, not the most pleasant conditions in which to be picking up garbage. “Monsoon is when the amount of garbage on the beach is the most, but it’s easier to work when it’s raining. The last time it rained, we even danced a bit,” says Mona Keshwani, one of the first volunteers to arrive. Since October 2015, over seven million kilos of garbage have been removed from the Versova beach in Mumbai.
Leading the group is Afroz Shah, 35, who grew up in Versova, and was appalled by what the beach had become — a vast swathe of refuse. It wasn’t like garbage hadn’t washed ashore during his childhood. What goes into the sea, in some form or another, finds its way back to land. “But I didn’t know how bad the situation had become in the last 10 years. I strongly believe this is because of our life of convenience. We go to malls, buy plastic, and it all ends up in the sea,” he says.
A lawyer in the Bombay High Court, Shah began to devote his weekends to picking the garbage with his hands, and inviting other residents for what he calls a “date with the ocean”. Some were swayed, many sent him back. “People asked me how long I would do it. Some were suspicious of my intentions. ‘Builder ke aadmi ho’, ‘Aap neta ban ne aa gaye,’ they said. But I believe the work has spoken and people from all over the world have noticed,” he says. It has been 99 weeks since the clean-up started.
Shah was among the six environmentalists to be named Champion of the Earth in 2016, the top environmental prize by the United Nations. His initiative has been lauded by activists, celebrities and politicians, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who congratulated Shah during one of his Mann ki Baat addresses. The central government has also decided to adopt Shah’s model to clean 13 beaches across the country. “The ministry asked me to share my experience. I told them that they shouldn’t make it a ‘government scheme’. It must be volunteer-driven, and people should get their hands dirty. I’ve seen people change since they started working with me, like Jay,” he says, patting a volunteer squatting next to him. “Because he comes here regularly to clean the beach, he doesn’t buy or use plastic anymore. Most of us here have stopped doing so,” he says.
In Versova, Shah is something of a local hero, greeted by people as he moves from one part of the beach to the other, lending a hand with digging up rubbish, and asking sanitation workers from the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation to have tea and samosas. “I don’t ask for money from anyone, but I do ask for volunteers and equipment,” he says. A brand-new earthmover stands nearby, courtesy the All India Plastics Manufacturers Association. “Can you believe I went to them?” he says, laughing.
Beach clean-ups have happened before in Mumbai. The Wildlife Conservation and Animal Welfare Association works to rescue sea turtles and has, for many years, organised clean-ups at Dahanu beach, north of Mumbai. According to Dhaval Kansara, WCAWA founder, the government push to the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan campaign has helped people take notice of the work at Versova.
It’s well past 11 am, over two hours since they started. Shah has called an end to the day’s work. The beach we leave behind is cleaner than it was in the morning. But the sea will continue to throw back at us what we throw into it. Does the thought bog him down, I ask Shah. “Do you see this smile on my face? I’m not here to change the planet. I’m doing what I can do keep this beach clean. Even these small efforts do make a difference,” he says.
