Prepare to be knocked off your feet. Raj Phaden, an ayurvedic professional from Fatehabad, Haryana, has quit his decade-old practice and set off on a bicycle to spread the message across the world of the dire need to protect the environment
Prepare to be knocked off your feet. Raj Phaden, an ayurvedic professional from Fatehabad, Haryana, has quit his decade-old practice and set off on a bicycle to spread the message across the world of the dire need to protect the environment.
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The quest -- which began in Bhuna, Hisar district, Haryana, on September 5 -- will see the 37-year-old cover Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Australia as well as Africa and other continents in eight to 10 years.
The green warrior arrived in Mumbai on Saturday and will depart in another two days. In each of the city Phaden has visited, he has conducted awareness seminars in schools and colleges on ways to reduce one’s carbon footprint, by taking up cycling, for example, and planted over 2,000 saplings with the help of locals.
He says his target group is school/college students -- an impressionable bunch -- "because if they understand how global warming affects us all, they can change our future."
A conscionable Phaden says his journey focuses solely on making people realise the catastrophic effects of global warming and take remedial measures. “Not many people are aware of or have taken serious cognisance of the effects of environmental pollution.” And what better way, he points out, to drive home this message than a cycle -- an eco-friendly choice of transport.
Phaden clarifies that he is not a professional cyclist, and started practising on a cycle gifted by a friend only around six months ago. His task, therefore, is all the more arduous. He is not only funding the journey himself -- he has spent around R1 lakh of his own so far, which includes buying saplings -- but is also not taking up boarding at others’ expense. He pitches a tent at a suitable spot, creates awareness, coaxes locals into joining him in planting saplings, and sets off on his way to another village or city.
Hitting the road in itself wasn’t an easy task. He had to convince his family comprising two siblings that he wasn’t moseying off into an exercise in futility. “When I told my family and friends about my plan, some of them called me crazy. But when they saw how determined I was, they got on board,” says Phaden.
Perhaps, it does take some amount of craziness to change the world.
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