Delhi wallas, this is for you

This is an appeal to Delhi wallas.



For complete home grown vegetable plants with roots, to be planted and hung up in tokris, on top of a bamboo canopy, something like a big umbrella.

This canopy will have a tea stall under it.

You might wonder why. Why plant vegetables on top of an umbrella?

Urban street kids, are totally unfamiliar with the process of growing food for themselves. When there is no place for them to live, where would they find the earth to grow vegetables?

There are chai shops on every nook and corner. We plan to get a chai walla in a place like Chandni Chowk, to use this structure as a tea stall. There is a rope ladder that will take the kids up the roof of the canopy, where we have hung thirty two small round baskets in which vegetable plants will be grown. The chai wallah will ensure that the kids do not vandalize the plants. That the plants are regularly watered. In return, he gets a fancy tea shop.

This is an effort to introduce street kids to play with wet soil, to sow seeds, to watch vegetables grow and finally to eat them. Kids being an impatient lot, we first want to show them the final version, that is, vegetable plants grown in the tokris.


So, if you or anyone you know is into growing these vegetable plants at home, please donate.

Spinach, Tomato, Peas, French, Beans, Brinjal, Chilli, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Mint Peppermint, Tulsi, ADHATODA ZEYLANICA (ADULSA), Aloe Vera, etc.

Your help will be appreciated and acknowledged. We will number every plant and send you a record of what is happening to it. For ex, plant number 15 fell down the canopy, but was rescued by Sanju, and now it is growing well.

We need home grown vegetables, by first week of December. Ideally, we need about ten plants of each variety, but whatever is available, is most welcome

My husband, Prayas Abhinav is doing this Public Art Project, as a part of city spinning. He has blogged about it here. The white shirt kid on the canopy is my son, Pavan. This canopy was the first prototype that we put up in Bangalore last month. We are working right now on a sturdy design that will stand by itself (this one needed to be dug in) and easily bear the weight of five kids at a time.

Contact
email: prayas.abhinav@gmail.com
Telephone : 09902591198
Address : B 7 /1 A, Vasant Vihar, New Delhi

To make it easier for you, we will send one of the boys to your house to get the vegetables.

If you know anyone who might be interested, please spread the word.