Cloth bag vending machine launched at Sivaganga temple

In a bid to promote the use of cloth bag (manjapai), Sivaganga Collector Asha Ajith launched an automatic vending machine at the famous Kollangudi Vettudaiyar Kaliamman Temple on Thursday.

In a bid to promote the use of cloth bag (manjapai), Sivaganga Collector Asha Ajith launched an automatic vending machine at the famous Kollangudi Vettudaiyar Kaliamman Temple on Thursday.

The State government banned the use of single use plastics since January 2019. Though officials have been conducting checks, the banned plastics are in still use.

Hence on December 2021, Chief Minister M.K. Stalin relaunched the campaign by introducing ‘Meendum Manjapai’ across the State, with Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board and Environment, Climate Change and Forests Department organising awareness programmes.

As a part of this initiative, the Collector launched the automatic vending machine at the temple. The officials said visitors could collect a cloth bag from the machine by dropping in a ₹10 coin, two ₹5 coins or 10 ₹1 coins. The machine would be functional round the clock.

The objective of launching the cloth bag vending machine was to ensure that people avoided the use of plastic bags to carry puja materials and acted responsibly in protecting the environment, they said, adding that based on the response, they would install more such machines across the district, especially at bus stands and uzhavar sandhais.

District Environmental Engineer S. Pandiarajan and Assistant Environmental Engineer K. Rajarajeswari were present.