Amala Bharatham in Sabarimala

As Neil Armstrong said "A small step for man is a giant leap for mankind". This project has surely inspired many more watching it to make India a cleaner and better place to live in.

It was the night of 5th of November 2011, when 10 buses travelled to the foothills of the holy mountain of Sabariamala – a pilgrimage spot in the state of Kerala. We reached the river Pampa at 1:30AM and then trekked uphill to the pilgrimage spot. Our batch consisted of more than 600 people. We reached Sabarimala by 4:45AM. By 7:00 am, we were ready for volunteer cleaning work along with other ashram residents and MA Math volunteers who reached a day earlier.

There were more than 3000 people ready, many reaching the previous day. Many more expected the next day. What we saw cannot be expressed in words – Women and men aged 60 plus to 75 or 80 yrs, smart and brisk, clad with a orange coat, a broom or a spade or a shovel in hand walking straight towards their workplace (the dump yards filled with plastic waste, glass bottles waste etc). Above all they had a beaming smile that captured our attention. I just thought – How did they climb uphill? How will they clean the huge waste? Why are they so happy? All this was happening at a single place at the same time.

Amma truly has inspired them. - they were on duty to make India a cleaner place, they were on duty to recover the pristine beauty of surrounding areas of Sabarimala. Who can make them feel so happy about cleaning???

This project was "AMALA BHARATAM CAMPAIGN at Sabarimala". Over 5000 people all clad in Amala Bharatham attire – Orange coat, Orange/ White gloves, Rubber boots and a broom/spade/shovel/basket in their hands surged forward to clean up Sabarimala. Rain, heat, dust, dirt, insects or even leeches (area has leeches because of the moist dense forest area) could not stop them. All of them moved with a single motto – Clean Sabarimala.

All the ashram residents, MA Math volunteers and Amrita students were clad in orange coat –it seemed that the whole place was painted in orange. This army of orange picked, cleaned, segregated thousands of tons of waste. Every used bottle, every broken glass, every plastic bag that was collected brought happiness to people collecting it. This was the cleaning that happened externally.

There was something else happening – A silent inner transformation was also happening. People said "I will reuse every mineral bottle I buy, I will not discard it immediately". Some others said "Now every waste that we see, shall be collected and put in the bins". Some expressed "We never ever felt so happy and so contended before. This is bliss in cleaning India. We are cleaning ourselves". Who can instill such values in a mass gathering? Who can motivate a mass gathering all at once? Who can unite so many humans from different walks of lives, ages, mentalities, cultures and societies?

Who could make this happen? Who could ever really make "unity in diversity "seem real in this age? It was a single leader that did this, inspired us. It was a single Mother that made this happen with her love and compassion.

She has inspired all of us through her own example. Amma's life is her teaching. We are so fortunate to have such an inspiring example amongst us.