On Gandhi Jayanti, volunteers remove waste materials from Mawmluh cave in Cherrapunjee -- a practice that they have been following since 2017
Guwahati: Like any other cleaning drive that was observed on Wednesday as part of Gandhi Jayanti, Meghalaya made its famous Mawmluh cave at Cherrapunjee in East Khasi Hills district a part of the nationwide initiative.
With an annual initiative taken by the Meghalaya Adventurers’ Tours and Mawmluh Tourism and the allied cooperative societies, the Mawmluh cave witnessed a cleaning drive in which the waste materials were cleared inside the cave.
When asked about the drive, secretary of Mawmluh Tourism and Allied Cooperative Societies, Basan Kupar Lyngdoh, told EastMojo about how they have been cleaning the cave every year which is famous for the ‘Meghalayan Age’.
The battle against plastic waste has brought massive challenges to the fragile eco-systems and locals retaining the nature’s bounty with such initiative.
“We are the cooperative society which is looking after the cave authorised to us by the village ‘dorbar’, so right from 2017, we have started up the cleaning drive of this cave every year even though it happens on the 2nd October or else even if the weather is not allowing us also we still do it later on or at later stage because the river that is flowing inside the cave, the upstream river it carries a lot of plastic,” Lyngdoh said.
Caving season is around the corner, which is the time to keep landscapes fresh for more underground adventures and expeditions. The caving season starts from the month of November because this is the cave that no one is allowed to enter without proper equipment and we want to protect the cave the way it is, the secretary added.