The Elliot’s beach aka Besant Nagar Beach in Chennai has been a favorite family haunt. Kuttyma religiously makes atleast couple of trips to the beach when she stays in Chennai. We visited the beach early Sunday morning during our recent visit and it left me sad.

Morning joggers, walkers, stuntmen, musclemen, castle builders, water lovers, screamers, gigglers, catchers, photographers and dreamers – the beach had them all. It also had tons of trash. It was a sickening sight. And of course there was NOT a single trash bin in the beach. The one trash bin I could spot was in the car park.

Leftovers from a busy Saturday night

Most of the waste was food waste – easily decomposable. Left me wondering why the stall owners do not provide trash bins. It was quite hard to find a clean spot to sit down in the sand.

And ofcourse there were the plastics

I had some interesting conversations with folks on twitter and the most common complaint from people who complain about the trash is the lack of trash bins. I spotted every stall at the beach advertising “Idea Cellular“. Idea! It would have been better if you sponsored trash bins instead of wasting money painting stores. I would have been impressed and actually said “What an idea!” (yeah bad joke on a clearly important issue)

Sunday morning silence at the food stalls that dot the beach

The green trash bin

And then there is the Karl Schmidt Memorial. As per Wikipedia, it was built in memory of a sailor who was drowned saving a girl. It is sad that there is no information about the memorial on the beach. It stands there alone and stark. It is beautiful as you can see – blue skies and sand. Extremely beautiful public URINAL. The place stinks.

The 80+ year old memorial could do with some repair and cleanup

I would assume at least 50% of the folks who frequent the beach have some basic education and know the importance of cleanliness and proper disposal of trash. Why is it we never do anything about it? Ofcourse I did nothing myself. I brought back the trash we generated and dumped it at home. This brings me to the next question – does anyone know any organizations/people who work on cleaning up the beaches in Chennai? I would love to get involved.