"Champion of the Earth": how an ordinary man cleared the beach of 5000 tons of garbage

A young Indian lawyer from Mumbai afros the Shah entered the fray with the trash, which for years has washed up on a beach Versova. And won. For 86 weeks Afroz, along with volunteers, removed 5.4 million kilograms of garbage from the beach.

In October 2015 a lawyer from Mumbai afros the Shah and his 84-year-old neighbor Harbans Mathur was very upset, seeing the city beach Versova — he was just littered with debris. The two men decided to clear the area.

Since then, every weekend they came for cleaning. Later they began to join the volunteers. Their number grew steadily and reached thousands of people.

Volunteers cleaned the beach 86 weeks. They were able to remove over 5 million pounds of garbage from a 2.5 km long beach. "It was amazing to see that people from the film industry, police, lawyers, fishermen and passers-by gather together for one reason, Shah said. — Officials have supported us by providing all the necessary excavation machines and trucks."

Work on cleaning up the beach ended in may 2017. "The beach is finally clean. Our efforts have borne fruit. Rubbish now gets to the shore with just the sea. We asked the authorities to begin to clean up the streams before monsoon to the beach remained neat," said Afroz Shah.

For his work afros the Shah received from the UN the title "champion of the Earth". His work was called the biggest beach cleanup in the world.

But the initiative of Afroza ends. Now he, along with volunteers, is going to prevent debris to get to the beach on a channel of the local streams. In addition, he wants to clear the overgrown debris of coastal mangrove forests, which serve as natural protection from storms. The example Afroz Shah wants to inspire people around the world.