A Unique Discussion Forum Educates City Residents About Preserving "Five Elements" of Nature

Bangalore, India, April 26, 2013 --(PR.com)-- CommonFloor.com, India’s leading real-estate and apartment management portal organised ‘RightStep’ – a discussion forum for creating awareness amongst residents residing in gated communities, across 5 cities, on practical yet cost effective ways of mitigating health risks that arise due to cellphone tower radiations, inefficient garbage management and pollution of air and water. The forum sensitized RWAs and residents of gated communities about the need for preserving and carefully utilizing the five elements of nature, i.e. earth (prithvi), air (vayu), water (jal), sky (aakash) and fire (agni) for healthy and safe living. RightStep is being organized across five cities of Bangalore, Gurgaon, Chennai, Hyderabad and Pune, in the run up to the ‘Earth Day’.

Key speakers at the forum included members from civic authorities, in addition to healthcare and other subject experts like: Mr. Shiva Kumar, Principal Investigator – RWH and Scientist, Karnataka State Council for Science and Technology, Indian Institute of Science; Mr. Hoysal N Chanakya, Chief Research Scientist, Centre for Sustainable Technologies, Indian Institute of Science; Mr. Shiv Anand, Heading Civil Defence initiative, formerly supported by Janagraaha; Mr. Vasanth Rao, Professional from SOSMOS. Mr. Krishna Mohan, Director, Vridhi Foundation; P S Gunaranjan, Founder of United Care Development Services; P Sravan Kumar, Hyderabad President, Fire and Security Association of India, among many other experts.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr. A.R. Shivakumar, Senior Fellow and Principal Investigator – RWH, KSCST, Indian Institute of Science said, “Water is a scarce resource in Bangalore city today. Population explosion has put enormous pressure on this precious resource. Simple and cost effective Rooftop Rainwater Harvesting (RWH) for individual buildings and apartments can be developed locally by communities to augment existing water supply. Open spaces around the buildings, apartments and public parks can act as common resources to recharge ground water for reviving dried or low yielding borewells. In addition, the storm water drains of Bangalore which often overflow and cause huge damage, will receive less flow of rainwater during heavy rains, thus avoiding flooding.”

Dr. Chanakya, Chief Research Scientist, Centre for Sustainable Technologies, Indian Institute of Science explained to the participants how ‘wastes’ today, are really resources of tomorrow: be it in the form of solid or liquid. “For a civilization, that has survived this part of the planet for over 3,000 years of recorded history, without creating systems to curtail excessive wastes, solid or liquid, it is indeed a difficult and anxiety laden proposition to find sustainable solutions to both these forms of wastes.” He remarked. “Dry and recyclable wastes need to be chaperoned or guided to the right channel such that recycling and reuse objectives are not only met but also function in a desirable manner for over a long period of time,” he added.

Mr. P S Gunaranjan, Founder of United Care Development Services spoke about the importance of segregating waste into organic, reusable and recyclable waste. He explained how apartment communities can create compost centers and use organic waste they generate as compost, while recyclable waste like newspapers can be recycled for a variety of uses. He also emphasized on the importance of donating reusable things like clothes, books etc. to those for whom these may be useful.

Mr. Vikas Malpani, Co-founder and Head – Communities, CommonFloor.com said, “We are very excited to see such enthusiastic participation from the residents and associations. We have been working with apartment communities for more than five years and are confident that discussions like these help residents in managing challenges of urban living - ranging from waste management to preserving, purifying and economically utilizing precious resources like water and air.”

About CommonFloor:
Launched in 2007 by Sumit Jain, Lalit Mangal and Vikas Malpani, CommonFloor.com, is an innovative online service that combines property search, apartment management and vendor management and caters to a person’s complete residential requirements. From searching for an apartment to facilitating interactions within an apartment community on the ‘common floor’ platform, to connecting one to relevant service providers, the portal is dedicated to meeting all aspects of consumers’ needs around their home. Commonfloor is currently present in 120 cities and has over 50,000 communities listed with it, which constitutes more than 50 Lakh homes. The company has been funded by Accel Partners and Tiger Global.