Hyderabad: A city-based university is pushing for eco-friendly clay Ganesh idols this year.
Professor Jayashankar Telangana State Agricultural University (PJTSAU) is producing organic colours for clay Ganesh idols at its own unit which can produce up to 2 tonnes of organic paints in a day.
The unit, which was set up last year with a budget of Rs 1 crore in collaboration with TSPCB, uses flowers, leaves, barks, roots, seeds, pods of certain trees which have colouring pigments.
“We powder the raw materials and boil them in water and then make them into concentrated dye by evaporating the water. Natural gum is then added to the concentrate and preservatives are used to increase the shelf life,” said Dr R. Geeta Reddy, professor and principal investigator of natural dye and paint unit at PJTSAU. The method was the brain child of the department of textiles in the College of Home Science.
The unit, situated in Rajendra Nagar, had produced 18 tonnes of paint which helped colour 80,000 clay idols. This year, they plan to colour two lakh idols with 22-tonne paint.
