From flowers and leaves to compost: Deoghar temples recycle floral offerings

RANCHI: In a boost to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Clean India Mission, offerings made to Lord Shiva Temple at Deoghar in Jharkhand will no longer be thrown away along with the city garbage from now on.

Rather, it is now being converted into organic fertilisers through the newly installed solid waste management machine at Mansingh Pond near the temple complex by the Power Grid Corporation of India Limited under Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative.

Remarkably, several lakhs of devotees visit Deoghar every year during ‘Shravani Mela’, who offer hundreds of tons of ‘belpatra’ and flowers along with other things to Lord Shiva.

“Offerings collected from all 22 temples in Deoghar by our volunteers are brought to Mansingh Chowk where a solid waste management plant has been installed by Power Grid Corporation Limited under Corporate Social Responsibility by investing Rs 19 lakh,”says Anshumali Singh, CSR in-charge of Power Grid Corporation in Deoghar.

The idea is to make maximum utilisation of the heaps of offerings made by the devotees every year, besides keeping the temple complex as well as the city clean.

“Presently, a machine with the capacity of one ton has been installed which could also be increased in future as per the requirement,” says Singh.

More than 5 quintal of vermi compost is can be made every year and be sold to the farmers, he adds.

Singh says the vermicompost being produced is currently sold to the farmers through Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK) and claimed to soon launch the product in packets of 1 kg, 2 kg and 5 kg packets.

“As different types of flowers and leafs are used for preparing vermin compost here, the product obtained here is of high quality hence the rates will be fixed after getting it examined in the laboratory,” says the CSR in- charge of Power Grid Corporation Limited.   

It requires various steps to prepare Vermin Compost, right from separating flowers and belpatra from other offerings, putting it into the machine and putting them into sacks after drying them, he added.

Singh says as many as 60 volunteers of Power Grid Corporation have been working hard to keep temple complex clean.

Baba Baidyanath -Basukinath Shrine Board has welcomed the initiative taken by Power Grid Corporation Limited as it has helped in satisfying religious sentiments of devotees visiting the temple by using the offerings made by them in philanthropy.

“It is really a great work done by the company as it is of great relief to us that the offerings made by the devotees will not be mixed up with garbage collected from the city and will be used for the use of farmers which ultimately feed the mankind,” Kartik Nath Thakur, a shrine board member, says.

In addition to that, the initiative will also help in keeping the temple complex clean as the offerings will not be dumped here and there on the way to the sanctum sanctorum, he added.