SHILLONG, Aug 8: A visit to the meadows below the Shillong Peak where Khasis believe the Lei Shillong deity resides reveals that someone has been working silently to green up the place. On Saturday this scribe saw hundreds of newly planted saplings being fenced by green nets to prevent them from being eaten up by cows and goats that graze in the area.
The local people have all been employed to do this task and are paid Rs 500 per day. The area is under the jurisdiction of the Syiem of Mylliem; hence the Social Conservation Department has signed an MOA with the Syiem to plant different indigenous seedlings and engage the local communities in protecting them before the trees are big enough to stand on their own strength.
L Shabong, Divisional Officer, Soil & Water Conservation Department and Director, Integrated Natural Resources Management (INRM) under the Meghalaya Basin Development Authority (MBDA), said that the effort to plant indigenous species of trees in that approximately 90 hectares of land is to recharge the strategic (Contd on P-4)
A silent mission to rejuvenate…
(Contd from P-1) catchment that feeds water to the entire population of Upper Shillong from 5th Mile downwards.
“It is not feasible to rely too heavily on the Mawphlang Greater Shillong Water Supply Project. We have to ensure that the traditional natural springs that have been sources of water for the people of Shillong are recharged,” Shabong said, adding that the place used to earlier have a nursery for tree saplings but those were damaged by miscreants who also delight in starting forest fires during winter.
The villagers who were engaged in the plantation work said that about 35,000 saplings will be planted in all. When asked if they know why they were planting so many saplings and fencing them off, they said it is because earlier the place was a forested area but has now become a grazing ground for cows and sheep after the trees were cut down over a period of time.
Shabong said the Soil & Water Conservation Dept & MBDA have converged in ensuring that boundary trenches were created around this area to prevent the grazing animals from eating up the saplings. “We had earlier mooted a scheme where tourists and picnickers coming to the area would be given a sapling to plant and they would donate money to a corpus fund which would be used to pay the persons nurturing the trees. Subsequently the donors would have the tree named after them. Unfortunately, the Department does not have the human resource nor the financial capacity to carry forward this scheme,” Shabong said, adding that there are also plans to connect the Rhododendron trail to the Upper Shillong forest for trekkers.
Interestingly the Department is also taking up water quality restoration at Umshing, Mawlai with the involvement of 11 localities. This is through dredging the river to remove solid waste and release of micro-organisms to cleanse the water and also the use of nettings to trap solid waste at different points along the River Umshing. “MBDA has knowledge partners from within the country and abroad who are contributing towards enriching our knowledge base. On the basis of these new learnings we are trying to implement river rejuvenation projects,” Shabong said.
Interestingly, the Soil & Water Conservation- MBDA partnership has also initiated action for removing acid mine drainage in the coal mining areas of Jaintia Hills through use of limestone and vetiver grass that absorbs the acid and other impurities.
Shabong also said that mine-spoil areas that used to be dumping grounds for coal and have turned rocky and barren are now being revived by planting aromatic plants like Vetiver, Citronella and Palmarosa.
“People are already growing these plants and they have a ready market for their oil extracts,” Shabong said, adding that the next big thing that people of Meghalaya should be seriously looking at is grey water treatment which is not a very expensive technology and also water harvesting.