HYDERABAD: The campaign for rejuvenating the country's lifelines began in the streets of Hyderabad on Friday with hundreds sporting 'Rally for Rivers' T-shirts, placards and headgear in different parts of the city.
Rally for Rivers, a pan-India campaign launched by the Isha Foundation in association with The Times of India, mobilised citizens from all sections of the society to make them aware of their role in reviving India's depleting rivers.
Over 3,000 people from areas like Dilsukhnagar, Panjagutta, Begumpet and HiTec City, among others, marched through the streets urging people to rally for rivers by giving a missed call to 80009-80009 as a vote of support for rejuvenating our rivers. Dr Raghu Ram, director and volunteer, Isha Foundation, along with fashion designer-cum-nutritionist Shilpa Reddy, badminton player Jwala Gutta and other prominent personalities and Isha volunteers held an awareness drive at the KBR Park on Friday .
"With this campaign we are providing the external push the nation needs to address the really grave issue of water depletion. We aim to mobilise the nation and garner support to make the necessary policy change," Shil pa Reddy said.
"The existing policies focus on the use of river water but the need of the hour is policies to conserve and revive our scarce water resources," she added.
Speaking on the occasion on Friday , Dr Raghu Ram said, "Today's campaign in the city, which is part of the pan-India campaign, is aimed at sensitizing people about the stark reality and requesting them to be part of this national movement to save our rivers."
To raise awareness, Isha Foundation founder SadhguruJaggi Vasudev will personally drive through 16 states from Kanyakumari to the Himalayas before heading back to Delhi for the grand finale on October 2. The rally will be flagged off by the union minister for environment, forest and climate change on September 3, 2017.
