An ideal green Diwali would be one with no crackers, but since that is totally unavoidable, three IT professionals from the city have come up Plan B. For every order placed on their website for crackers, a sapling will be planted.
Brothers Vishwajeeth and Vishnuvardhan Vangala, along with their friend Naveen, had gone to buy crackers in 2013. “When we got to the market we found that there was a huge disparity between the manufacturing price and the selling price. We realised that it would be difficult for middle class families to buy crackers and it was then that we decided to sell crackers for low prices,” explains Vishwajeeth.
Vishnuvardhan
What started in 2013 as a business plan ended up with them launching their website (Hitech Crackers) in 2014. “Later in 2014 we found that Rs 3,000 crore worth of crackers are bought each year, and it was a waste of money and a huge cause of pollution. So we wanted to start an anti-pollution campaign, but we realised that it was of no use as people would anyway buy crackers,” adds Vishnuvardhan.
So the trio decided to continue with the sales of crackers, but came up with a green twist. “We decided that for every order that is placed on our website we will plant a sapling,” says Naveen. Even though they planted around 30 saplings in 2014, this year seems to be more promising.
Naveen
“Last year we didn’t sell much, but this year we’re back stronger and the sales have been good. We expect to plant around 150-160 saplings after the sale,” says Vishwajeeth. But the search for a place to plant is still on. “We don’t want to plant these saplings just about anywhere, we want to make sure that they are taken care of,” adds Vishwajeeth.
The group is also donating a portion of their income to charity. Vishwajeeth adds, “Since we are all working professionals, this setup is not for commercial purposes. We did start it with the purpose of making profits, but realised that we didn’t want to do that anymore. Funds from the sales will now be used for development activities in rural areas.”
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