"BAN PLASTIC",Essay by Nethikar Mounika. B.Sc - FSCCa, 3rd Year.

On June 5, 2025, as India celebrated World Environment Day with the theme “One Nation, One Mission: End Plastic Pollution.” I remember Prime Minister Modiji's words hitting me hard. “Every plastic bottle we toss away is like a scar on our planet's heart.” It felt so real, especially after seeing clips of a massive cleanup drive along the Ganges. Leaders, students and even kids were out there pulling out plastic bags, bottles from the river. It was messy, emotional and made me rethink - how did we let our sacred rivers, whom we worship get so choked with trash? That day I felt some contribution of any sort must be done from our side.

Plastic Pollution isn’t just about dirty rivers, though. It’s everywhere. An article from Hindu, not so long ago mentioned India throws about 5.8 million tonnes of plastic every year, and the smoke from that messes up the air, it is scary to think about breathing in those toxins, but we actually do. Many Indian Cities like New Delhi, Noida, Durgapur, Patna, ect. often appear in top 10 of World AQI (Air Quality Index) rankings. Microplastics being the major component of the pollution.

In landfills, there are piles of plastic bags and wrappers that don’t break down, leaking chemicals into the ground, from where we grow our food. From a year the major hot topic has been microplastics - they are everywhere in water, food, air even in our bodies causing major health problems.

But there are people fighting back, which gives hope. Like Matti Malhar Kambe, a young man from Mumbai - who recently received the National Creators Award 2024 has been doing incredible work with his group “Beach Please”. They clean up Beaches, make for funny videos to get people’s attention and promote things like Bamboo straws, cloth bags so on. Malhar’s mantra - Refuse, reuse, rethink has become a rally cry. He has become an inspiration for GenZs.

The World is starting to wake up too. Back in 2022 United Nations Environment Assembly in Nairobi, 175 countries got together and promised pledged to make a treaty to stop plastic pollution by 2040, by cutting down on making new plastic recycling more and get rid of single use stuff. Still it is not easy, India banned single use plastics in 2022, which was effective for certain time but no proper implementation and no proper alternative like plastic introduced plastic same back. Globally only 9% of plastic gets recycled.

The rest just sits in landfills or gets dumped in places like India from rich countries. The Global Waste Trade is reality, this unfair treatment, must stop. But I believe we can change things. Cities like Indore is doing amazing work with community cleanups, making it the cleanest city each time. As Amit Ray, an Indian author said “A plastic pollution-free world is not a choice but a commitment to life”, Let’s honour the commitment for our rivers, our soil, our air and our next generation.