Environmental Sustainability

 

Under the Company’s Jal Jivan initiative, water conservation initiatives were rolled out to ensure the availability of water in communities identified as water stressed.

 

Energy Efficient Cookstoves

 The key objective of the project is to promote sustainable and cleaner form of cooking around the communities where we are present by conducting awareness and distribution of energy efficient and eco-friendly cookstoves. United Way of Mumbai and Sambhav Foundation are the implementing partners of this project.

 

Access to potable water

 In FY22 Mahindra Holidays & Resorts India Ltd. had constructed a water tank in Prini, Manali to provide the facility for storage of water to households. To ensure the households have easy access to potable water, through this project, the water tank will be connected with a pipeline to a glacier. This would provide residents with a long-term sustainable solution to their existing water woes.

 

United Way of Mumbai is the implementing partner of this project.

 

Alternate energy options (solar) for the community

 In order to provide safe and conducive working environment, street vendors in Alibaug Taluka will be provided with solar lanterns to enable them to generate higher income to support their families. Most street vendors are heavily dependent on streetlights to sell their goods. Some of them also use gas lanterns or Chinese lights. Through this project, our aim is to enhance the lives of the local community and make solar lighting a more acceptable way to eradicate light poverty.

 

United Way of Mumbai is the implementing partner of this project.

 

Rejuvenation of a water body in Puducherry

 The Company partnered with the organisation Sri Aurobindo Society to raise awareness amongst the local community on water conservation in Bahour, Puducherry. The three main components of the project were to desilt Bahour Tank in order to enhance its water storage capacity, organize sensitization programs across local educational institutes on water conservation and also collaborate with the Bahour Commune Panchayat to organize awareness workshops in the community.

As a part of this, Sri Aurobindo Society through the Bahour Tank Association, carried out the Bahour tank desilting to the order of 15,000 cubic meter increasing the water holding capacity by that volume as well as carried out the strengthening of the Bahour tank bund using the desilted soil. As part of the school programme, extensive water-communication activities including installation of rain-gauges and recording rainfall by children as a routine activity during rainy seasons, installing roof top water harvesting systems, conducting competitions, activities based on experiential learning methods were carried out. Activities were also implemented for women SHGs in the Bahour Commune as part of community outreach activities.

 

Chlorination of drinking water sources in Wayanad District, Kerala

Excessive rainfall in Kerala in August 2019 led to flooding which caused contamination of a large number of water sources in Wayanad district, Kerala. As a major source of water for families in the district, cleaning and chlorination of wells became critical in order to provide access to clean drinking water free of contamination, thereby reducing and curbing outbreak of diseases. The Company partnered with SEEDS (Sustainable Environment and Ecological Development Society) to provide safe drinking water in order to improve health and hygiene amongst vulnerable communities. Through the project with SEEDS, our aim was to clean community wells to support 200 marginalised families of Wayanad District with their potable water requirement. Re-establishing potability of water will enable future resilience of these marginalised communities.

Rooftop rainwater harvesting structures in Udaipur, Rajasthan

The Company worked with the NGO Students Relief Society, to identify 20 Government schools in Udaipur to set up Rooftop Rainwater Harvesting structures. The aim is to make the schools self-sufficient and to inculcate sustainable water management practices through school-based IEC (Information, Education and Communication) approach. This project will benefit the 7,623 children though facilitation, awareness and construction of rainwater harvesting structures for fulfilling the daily requirement of potable drinking water.

Access to Water in drought affected areas of Maharashtra

In November 2018, the Maharashtra government declared drought in 151 tehsils out of 358 tehsils in the state. These tehsils were spread across 26 out of 36 districts. The NGO United Way of Mumbai conducted a manual verification of the ground conditions, a mandatory step before declaring drought, five districts — Jalgaon, Beed, Ahmednagar, Aurangabad and Solapur — were found to be affected by the calamity the most. Drought affected district, Solapur required support towards storage of water, repair of pipelines and alternate livelihood measures. The Company partnered with the NGO to repair and provide better water storage facility at two villages, to avoid wastage of water and to ensure equal water supply to the community. 

Mahindra Hariyali – Tree plantation initiatives

Club Mahindra planted 24,125 saplings in FY22, taking the total count to 4,94,411 trees since the beginning of the project in 2010-11. Our endeavour is to improve green cover and protect biodiversity in the country. We also installed a drip irrigation system for the 300 trees we planted in Narambai village, Puducherry to ensure the survival of the trees planted.

Phenk Mat Mumbai

Under the campaign ‘Phenk Mat Mumbai’, Club Mahindra along with the organisation Centre for Social Change and Behavior Change Communication aims to create awareness and educate youth in Mumbai on cleanliness, hygiene and good sanitation practices and also encourage them to implement the same through a variety of activities and awareness drives. Till date, we have reached out to over 2 lakh children through this initiative.

  

Renewable Energy initiatives

Club Mahindra has undertaken Renewable Energy projects in villages around our Corbett, Kanha and Gir resorts where we have installed solar street lights in areas that are either dimly lit or have no electrification. Solar lighting not only saves energy and offsets greenhouse gases, but it also helps promote local enterprises as small shops and village markets can use the systems to provide lighting to operate during the evening.