Mumbai : A YouTube video of a cute, little girl in pink talking about a mundane incident that happened in her family could hardly match up to loud protests to save Mumbai’s green cover. But this little step by a group of concerned citizens is garnering as much attention as the rallies and protest marches against the uprooting of 2298 trees from Aarey colony for Metro III.
City-based film-makers have come out with five such films for the cause of saving Aarey. The concept, which was formulated in the early days of the Save Aarey movement in November, received support from professional film-makers Koushik Sarkar, Pankaj Thakur and Tarannum Pasricha. The videos were conceptualized and shot at several locations inside Aarey colony in December at a zero budget and volunteers even contributed financially for the cause. The editing and post-production was done in the ensuing months and the first video of the little girl addressing the Prime Minister was released on February 28. It has got a good 5,950 ‘views’ so far and people have appreciated it with comments like, “Sending a strong message without involving politics” or “Really fantastic- only we have to act accordingly.”
The next three videos are much shorter where still shots of Aarey colony are compared to those of highrises and people are asked to choose. A video film called Photoshop asks whether viewers want to see Aarey being replaced by highrises. The most recent video was posted on March 19 where known tree lover Renee Vyas is seen addressing a group of students in one of her nature walks. “Even President Obama needs oxygen,” she says to the children in the video.
“We are not against the Metro carshed but we want it constructed elsewhere. Aarey is too important. And they should stop talking about transplanting trees… we all know what happens to them later. MMRDA wasn’t even able to maintain the trees they had planted in Aarey. Besides, those were non-native varieties. Does MMRDA even have a horticulturalist or an expert in the team?” Vyas told FPJ on Thursday. She is conducting more nature walks inside Aarey colony for the cause.
“Our objective was to create awareness in the matter and to mobilize popular opinion. We want more and more people to come to Aarey to realize what they might lose out on. And audio-visual was the best medium we could pick to reach out to maximum number of people,” informed Padmaja Krishnan, one of the brains behind the videos.
Besides, the activists have also planned a human chain at Marine Drive on Friday evening and a ‘Meditate with Trees’ programme on Saturday to further the cause.
Tanvi Deshpande
