Madhya Pradesh’s Orchha is renowned as the city of King Rama, where Lord Rama is worshipped as a king. Around 8 KMs away from this place is Taragram, and here, a brilliant movement has been initiated in order to protect the environment. In Taragram, unused cloth is used to produce paper, and if this paper is put in soil after use, plants grow. The reason behind the same is that during the process of making paper with cloth, seeds are mixed in the same. This is now being believed to be the best replacement to polyethene.
These small-scale industries are being operated in the area’s Vavedi forest spread. Unit In-charge Anil Dwivedi has said that in order to make paper, cloth clippings are sorted first, as a result of which, all kinds of waste and metal get separated. These clippings are then melted by soaking them in hot water, and a paste is prepared after melting the cloth. Then, alum is added to the paste and it is beaten. Following which, paper is produced with the help of a hydraulic press.
The paper is dried up for 48 hours after it is made, and then the finishing of it takes place. Finally, boxes and diaries are made after cutting the paper. Dwivedi added that as per the demands of the firms, seed papers are prepared in various designs. Writing paper, file paper, diary cover, envelopes, heavy boxes, and seed paper are all produced here. The reach of Taragram’s products is till the overseas. The foreign tourists who visit Orchha buy these products and take them along. Every year, products worth around 50 lakhs go abroad. Now, the demand of the products has started emerging from various cities of India as well.
This environment-friendly initiative is the brainchild of Dr Ashok Khosla, who has worked for environment protection for a long time now. Dr Khosla said that when the awareness related to the cutting of trees and planting more trees increased, they started finding solutions as well. This was when they discovered the technology of producing paper from cloth. He added that it was widely known how in order to produce paper, trees are cut limitlessly. He mentioned how the technology was first learned completely by everyone and was then implemented. Now, the workers at Taragram prevent one tree from being cut down by producing 100 KG of cloth.
