With the lead taken by INS Shivaji, the naval base at Lonavala, which originally went green with scientific disposal of plastic, the CME coming up with the plastic ban in the last week and the National Defence Academy (NDA) already following the dictum strictly and severely, environment-savvy Army establishments in the city are slowly going plastic-free one after the other.Southern Command and Dehu Road have not implemented such a ban yet, but according to the Armed Forces spokesperson, D J Narain, the matter was brought up at the Chief of the Staff Conference a month back. ``The point was that Pune cantonment should be made free of plastic, but further meetings need to be held,'' he says.
The NDA has had a ban on plastic packets for more than three years now, which was a few days back supplemented with a ban on smoking in public places. Gol Market, the central shopping complex in the NDA premises, does not make sales in plastic bags. While cadets carry their own khaki satchels, the rest of the officersand their families have to make do with paper packets and shopping bags. ``Part of our premises have been declared an animal sanctuary and we have bird-watching and nature study clubs,'' informs Major C S Joshi, spokesperson, NDA, adding that all this was taken into account while imposing a ban on plastic bags. ``We have duty officers routinely carrying out checks to ensure that the rules are being followed,'' he says.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
