A plog-a-thon is a marathon in which participants collect garbage during event on Saturday

PUNE: The first 'Plog-a-thon' drive in the city organised by the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has collected 19 tonnes of garbage. Nearly one lakh people participated in this drive. A plog-a-thon is a marathon in which participants collect garbage during event on Saturday.

The event was an outcome of “plogging”, a Swedish fitness trend, started in 2016. That initiative had inspired thousands around the world to mix their morning run with cleaning of streets and gardens in their neighbourhoods.

According to the civic body’s press statement, the drive was carried out on 98 main roads and 187 gardens along with 500 civic and private schools. Nearly 775 locations were covered in the drive. Citizens’ groups, NGOs, school students, sports personalities and politicians participated in the run. The programme concluded with an oath for cleanliness and maintaining it.

“The river banks of Mula and Mutha are highly polluted areas of the city. A special was drive was carried out on these areas. Other parts of the city were covered,” Dnyaneshwar Molak, head of PMC’s solid waste management department, said.

According to civic officials, a total of 19,815 kg of plastic was collected in the drive. The initiative has been taken to promote Swachh survey and increase Pune rank in the national cleanliness ranking. The drive started from Karve statue in Kothrud at 8am and ended at Bhide bridge at 10.30am.

A group of citizens in Kalyaninagar had carried out such drive in June. A few dozen citizens had joined the drive in their tracksuits and running shoes.

They stepped out early to combine exercise with trash picking.

