Mani Manickem

Helping others after he himself was assisted is a natural progression for M. Mani, who is working towards becoming his community’s parliamentary representative in the next five years. Between working with Aid India and as an IndiaUnheard Community Correspondent, Mani has education, health, corruption and empowerment covered – and is addressing issues related to them to the benefit of everyone in his community and beyond.

Chennai’s lake Chembarambakkam will be polluted if a proposed dumping site is built.

“As it is, drinking water is a big problem in Chennai,” says Mani, “and now they are planning to build a dumping site near Chembarambakkam Lake. We will all suffer. The water I drink comes from this lake.”

The Chembarambakkam reservoir provides most of Chennai’s water, a city which consumes approximately six million litres of water everyday. The government is planning to build a sanitary landfill site that will hold and treat more than 455 tonnes of waste from five municipalities and one town. If they do this, the ground water will be polluted and more than 5000 people affected. The construction has been stalled because of prolonged protests by the villagers who have filed a court case, approached the Collector and have regular meetings at the village level to discuss the issue.

The ex Village Council Head of Kuthambakkam is Mani’s close friend and, when the building of the dumping site was announced in the newspapers, he called Mani for support in their campaigns. Despite a report by the Pollution Committee, plans to construct the landfill have not been scrapped.

If you want to help these villagers fight for their cause, please sign the Save Chembarambakkam petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/Clake/petition.html