Donate floral offerings to shelter homes: SC

The Supreme Court has urged temple towns across the country to follow in the footsteps of the Uttar Pradesh Women Welfare department’s initiative to donate “huge” floral offerings received at temples to destitute women and widows’ shelter homes.

The department, under Principal Secretary Renuka Kumar, ensures that the flowers, after use in the temples in Vrindaban and Mathura, are sent to the shelter homes.

The inmates of these shelters use the flowers to make eco-friendly products like sugandh essence, sugandh jal, agarbatti, etc, with the technical support of Floral and Fragrance Development Centre, Kannauj, under the Union Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Ministry. Earlier dumped as garbage, the flowers are now a major source of rehabilitation, dignity and earning for the Vrindavan widows, the Supreme Court acknowledged the novel initiative.

‘Dumped as garbage’

Ms. Kumar wrote to the Supreme Court Bench of Justices Madan B. Lokur and Deepak Gupta about the effort in a letter on March 17. “Earlier, the floral offerings were either being dumped in river Yamuna or dumped elsewhere as garbage. Under the initiative of the Department of Women Welfare in Uttar Pradesh, the floral offerings are now being used for making eco-friendly products like sugandh essence, sugandh jal, gulal, dhoop batti, agarbatti, etc...” the court noted in its eight-page order.

Directive sought

Ms. Kumar asked the court to direct the temples and local administrative authorities of Vrindavan and Mathura to deposit floral offerings only to the premises of widow and destitute shelter homes run by Uttar Pradesh Mahila Kalyan Nigam in Vrindavan and not to dump these offerings at any other place or send them elsewhere. The court directed the Nagar Nigam Mathura to ensure that the flower offerings are collected and deposited with shelter home premises of the Uttar Pradesh Mahila Kalyan Nigam. Finally, the court asked the National Commission for Women to examine if similar initiatives can be taken in other temple towns like Puri, Varanasi, etc.