Report by –Sandeep Juneja, Dated: October 18, 2008 : We surveyed in the schools of Chandigarh and collected some view of teachers and students about the Diwali crackers. And found out interesting facts and their perspectives
More.Mr. Pawan Tandon an English teacher in a reputed school told us that he has been working as a teacher for past 17 years and since then he has been taking views from his students about Diwali. He says that he himself is in the contrast for the support of playing high on crackers. Another teacher Richa Sharma and school front office executive Seema Prabhakar shared the same feelings. They say they always advice to play safe and without crackers. Seema told us that she prefers to decorate house, do rituals and after pooja ceremony with family they just lit some candles on Diwali.
We probed more into interest of students and found out something more to surprise. We were told about the Interact Eco Club at National Public School, Sector 18, Chandigarh. Trying to find out the people behind the club and the reason to formulate such club was very transparent; it had something to do with environment. Monica a class Xth student in the school, who is an acting President for the Eco Club, told us that it’s very much to do with the health of people and about awareness. She added that they are against crackers and also advice people to celebrate Diwali with full fervor but without crackers. Discussing main aim of Eco club, Arshpreet (class Xth), added that they have had a rally to aware people about their health hazard due to pollution of smoke and dust due to crackers.
Some more students who showed their interest in giving their contribution about Anti-Cracker movement were Akanksha, Amarjit, Monica and Jatin all from NPS. They gave us their thoughts in written in small paragraphs.
Akanksha Gupta, showed rage against cracker-making factories. She held them responsible for creating such polluting crackers. “I will ban the cracker factories if given power” she said.
Amarjit Kaur, with very nice and gentle voice, said that it’s okay with the small crackers because the families have to celebrate the festival. But she said a big No No to the huge and noisy crackers. She said that they pollute the environment both by foul smog, Carbon monoxide, and other poisonous gases. Also the noise has ill effects of brains of kids and students.
Jatin Mehta said that crackers where spoil health then they are dangerous too. He says that many people get injured by bursting crackers in their hands and some have lost their eye sights too. He is an active member for Eco club and has taken part in Anti-cracker rallies several times which he says were being telecast on a local news channel too.
So basically on the day one of survey we found out that students and teachers of school find it difficult to teach people who still are miscreants. There are many people on the other hand which already have adopted the anti-cracker environment at their homes.