With Diwali just around the corner, many are decorating their houses with fairy lights but a group of citizens are making efforts to revive the art of pottery.
Anshul Saxena started ‘#PottersKiDiwali’ to spread awareness about indigenous potters and traditional ‘Diyas’ (earthen lamps). The posts shared people’s interaction with potters in states like Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Assam, Jharkhand, Manipur etc.
On Tuesday, thick smoke could be seen coming out of a number of furnaces inside homes of Kumhar Gram. The village, in West Delhi’s Uttam Nagar, houses several potter families, many whom have been living there for decades. Residents of nearby Bindapur had filed a case before the NGT in February 2017, claiming potters were running industrial units in the area. After the NGT ruling, the South Corporation had directed potters to stop “trade and industrial activities”.
Meanwhile, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) received a complaint on Twitter regarding air pollution in the area from Dipendu Das, a resident of Suraksha Vihar near potters’ village.
