|
MUMBAI:
NDTV and Toyota’s Greenathon saw many environmentally conscious
people from across the globe come forward to take the green pledge
and adopt villages by donating for TERI’s ‘Lighting a
Billion Lives’ project that aims at solar powering villages
across the country. This 24-hour nonstop effort for the environment
received an overwhelming response by country’s leading corporates,
top Bollywood stars, musicians, environmentalists, NGOs and educational
institutions and generated over Rs 2.4 crores. Some of the generous
donors for the campaign were Shilpa Shetty; Shahrukh Khan and Billu
team; Lalit Modi; Yuvraj Singh; Sanjay Dutt and family; Preity Zinta,
Nokia; Coca-Cola and, Aarav, son of actor Akshay Kumar.
 Actor
Shilpa Shetty adopted 4 villages and set the momentum to be the
first highest donor soon followed by Shahrukh Khan and Billu Team
who adopted 5 villages. Akshay Kumar’s son- Aarav became the
youngest donor of the campaign by adopting a village. IPL’s
Lalit Modi adopted the largest village without lights while actor
Vivek Oberoi who also sponsored one village, pledged to continue
the good deed every year. Also stepping forward were Sanjay Dutt
and family who adopted 2 villages; cricketer Yuvraj Singh; campaign
ambassador Preity Zinta; Preity’s mother; actor Arjun Rampal
and Nina Pillai, amongst others.
Some
leading corporates also showed their solidarity towards the cause,
the highest donors being Coca-Cola and Nokia who sponsored 4 and
3 villages respectively; S Kumar’s Nitin Kasliwal adopted two
villages and Bombay Dyeing’s Ness Wadia adopted one village.
Other corporate who donated to the cause were: Toyota Kirloskar
Motors; ARM Embedded Technologies; SRF; Rexfam Hindustan Tin Works;
Ozone Group; Wizcraft; Qualcomm; Dentsu India; Luthra & Luthra;
Namita Gautam, Director, Sheela Group and Asian Roots Spa’s
Kamyani Kanwar, amongst others.
Bollywood
stars like Bipasha Basu, Celina Jaitley, Nagesh Kukunoor, Aftab
Shivdasani, Neil Nitin Mukesh, Madhuri Dixit, Kailash Kher, Farah
Khan, Diya Mirza, Kunal Kapoor, Tushar Kapoor, Shaan, Govinda, Sunidhi
Chauhan, Raageshwari and Shilpa Rao and Sukhwinder Singh lent support
to this campaign by signing solar lanterns which would be auctioned
at a later stage.
Actor,
model and ‘Marathon Man’ Milind Soman ran for 24 hours
at a stretch, covering 60kms, to raise funds for the campaign. He
started from Yashraj Studios, covering prominent places like Juhu
Beach, Bandra Reclamation, Haji Ali and Trident Hotel and returned
the same way.
The
Greenathon, a 24-hour programming initiative dedicated to create
environmental awareness, which commenced on Saturday 7th Feb 09
at 7pm was inaugurated by Dr. Prannoy Roy and Dr. R K Pachauri.
The Greenathon was hosted by Vikram Chandra and Preity Zinta while
Cyrus Broacha kept the viewers entertained for 24 hrs with his witty
humour. Simultaneous relay cleanup activities were conducted in
Delhi and Mumbai as part of the campaign.
The
clean-up drive at Qudesia Ghat, Yamuna in Delhi organized by NGO-
Swecha involved several activities like music concerts by bands-
Advaita, Parikrama, Mrigya, Menwhopause; canvas painting by artist
Anjolie Ela Menon; monument building using waste paper and a graffiti
canvas to express one’s thoughts on the polluted Yamuna. Attending
the event were renowned politicians, celebrities and environmentalist
like Sandeep Dixit, Naveen Jindal, Rina Dhaka, Nafisa Ali, Daler
Mahendi, Shibani Kashyap and Mike Pandey. Many excited school children
and university students thronged the venue in large numbers to participate
in the relay clean-up of the river bank.
Mumbai
sea front clean-up activities saw the presence of Bollywoood stars
like Preity Zinta, Raveena Tandon, Sonali Kulkarni, Prasoon Joshi,
Luke Kenny, cast and crew of TV show Jasuben Jayantilal Joshi Ki
Joint Family and BMC Commissioner Jairaj Pathak.
The
supporting sponsor for ‘The Greenathon’ was Vodafone.
The
lines for donation are still open and donations can be made through
Mchek and demand draft.
- "
For Mchek: SMS "[donate] [space] [amount]" to
56388
**For users in India only. Standard VAS charges apply.
- "
Cheque/DD: Send in favour of 'The Energy and Resources
Institute' payable at New Delhi, mail to Greenathon, NDTV, Archana
Complex, GK 1, New Delhi-110 048.
For
more details, visit our green website:www.green.ndtv.com
|
