Yugratna Srivastava Climate Change UN speech

Yugratna Srivastava, a 13-year-old girl from Lucknow, India addressed the United Nations Climate Change Summit in New York on Tuesday. Yugratna’s speech was cheered on by world leaders including UN General Secretary Ban Ki-Moon. The girl exudes tremendous confidence in her speech. The video could not be uploaded due to some problem with blogger as well as Youtube. I managed to get this grab on net.

Summit on Climate Change

22 September 2009
Speech of Yugratna Srivastava

Respected UN Secretary General Mr. Ban Ki - moon, Honourable Dignitaries and August Assembly.

I am 13 years young Yugratna from organisation Tarumitra,
meaning Friends of Trees, which is an NGO of 1600 high
schools and involved in promoting environmental awareness.
I feel privileged to represent children and youth, 3 billion of the
world’s population in this Summit on Climate Change.
I am so much concerned about climate change because
I don’t want our future generations to
question us just as I am questioning

the need of more concrete action on climate change today.

The Himalayas are melting, polar bears are dying, 2 of every 5
people don’t have access to clean drinking water, earth’s
temperature is increasing, we are losing the untapped
information and potential of plant species ,

Pacific’s water level has risen,
Is this what we are going to hand over to our future generations?
Please…….no!

We received a clean and healthy planet from our ancestors and
we are gifting a damaged one to our successors?

Is their any justice in this?

Honourable Excellencies, we need to call for an action now. We
have to protect the earth not just for us

but for our future generations.
If not here then where, if not now then when and

if not us then who?

Please listen to our voices.

The future needs strong vision and leadership!

One month ago, we had a TUNZA International Children and
Youth Conference in Korea.

The 800 participants and several thousands online developed

a statement requesting you as leaders to:
Agree on a more fair, just and action oriented post-Kyoto
agreement adopted and implemented by all countries
Not just formulate policies but also enforce them by
translating them into actions.

1. Please stop the people who are making Mother Earth Cry.
2. Why cut the oxygen generating forests

to create CO2 generating industries?
3. Include carbon and ecological footprint information in products.
4. Adapt to a green economy and sustainable production.
5. Develop a multi-national climate facility to monitor
climate response strategies.

The high tech. society and currency deposits in bank are of no
use if we don’t have a compatible biosphere.
In the awareness, it is not just about
solving an environmental problem….

but it is exclusively about changing the mindset and
attitude of people!

Educate students about the climate change by making
environmental education mandatory at all the levels of learning.
To get a sustainable Earth, we don’t need to stop the
developments. The need is quest and expansion of affordable
eco-friendly technologies available to common man like Energy
Efficient Campuses, Bio-fuels and Renewable energy sources.

I just want to ask all the world leaders two questions:-
1. Do environmental problems recognize any geographical or
political boundaries and age groups? My answer is certainly no.
This is why, we have the UN to talk each other about these
issues. I request you to please include the voices of children and
youth in all your decisions.
2. If national security and peace, and economic growth are
priorities, than why not climate change?
I know that you all are great leaders but overall we all are
humans. We all have a kind heart. I am sure that UN
negotiations at Copenhagen this year will end with
recommendations for good of humanity…and they have to.
Whatever has happened in the past is over.

We just have present and future in our hands.

Let’s act in the present to secure our future.
We have one Mother Earth: Care it and Share it.

Respected leaders, when you all make policies, please think of a
child suffering in greenhouse heat and

think of the species craving to survive.

Mahatma Gandhi said “Earth has enough to satisfy everyone’s need but no one’s greed"

A bird can fly in air, a fish can swim in water,

a leopard can run far faster,

But we the humans have been supernaturally gifted with mind….

a capability to think, change and reform ….

so come on let us all use these abilities to save our birthplace….
our home…. our mother earth!

Thank You !!!

The complete speech is taken from UN archives.

Pace of life: Forever accelerating

As life moves fast, situations we deal with, change faster. 'Yesterday' has long been forgotten, 'tomorrow' has been extensively planned with Plan A and backed up with Plan B, C and D with 'today' falling a casualty to the insecurity of future.

Everyone wants to pack as much as possible within one life span. Everybody wants a bigger garden and better plants and trees. But alas, most forget to pause and smell the proverbial 'roses' from their own garden.

This is not unique to the present generations only. Our forefathers too complained of life picking up pace and so will our future generations. It is important for an individual to figure out the priorities in life and follow them. That would be living life to the fullest.

I remember my collegue talking to the father of my ex-boss. The septuagenarian was complaining of how todays generation has lost its focus on any one issue and keeps fiddling around multiple things at the same time and how people have become overall less attentive and more greedy with an ever increasing list of wants. My collegue the articulate chap that he was, asked the old man, 'How long the people used to live in earlier generations?' His answer was 'Very old, 100 years was not uncommon back then.' THATS WHY!!! my collegue said, now we no longer are gonna live 100 or even 60's are unsure of and so we need to pack as much as possible within the short lifespan we have.

With the advent of service industry and burgeoning population, my take is that our earning lifespan is even more reduced and 50's might be the new 60's. So is it wise to earn now as much as possible and save maximum for the later part of our lives or stick to the traditional route? TAKE YOUR CALL! but in either case do not forget to count your blessings and do smell the roses in your own garden!

Last day of man before dying

Last Day Dream [HD] from Chris Milk on Vimeo.

This is a good video. It shows the events that one would remember as one lays on the death bed. The thoughts that would flash through your eyes as you are just about to close your eyes.

Congressie obsession with trivial issues - Shashi Tharoor

Congress is whipping its technocrat-turned-politician super diplomat Shashi Tharoor. The whipping is not due to some faulty policy decision or a governance related issue. Instead this time he is being held responsible of insensitivity towards the party diktat of austerity. His tweet which was in a response to a fellow bloggers question whether he will join the austerity drive was "Yes, I will travel cattle class in solidarity with the holy cows."

Some think the holy cow was Rahul Baba. So Jayanti Natarajan lambasted Tharoor as being insensitive. Tharoor had a problem with his tweeting earlier too, when a circular had asked government employees to not use internet from their offices. Security threat you see?

I wonder why the neta's are so paranoid about Tharoor tweeting that they are out to "out-tweet" him.

Shashi Tharoor's tweet does display his arrogance or in a way shows that he considers himself to be above the 'cattle class' It might have been an unintentional or misunderstood tweet. The limitations of 140 character speeches and brevity, one could say.
Congress on the other hand can only trip over by blowing this non-issue into a national debate. This speaks of the push-pull politics within the Congress too where in a technocrat is fawned upon by the seasoned neta's who have toiled hard in a different manner than Tharoor or Montek or Nandan.
This trivial issue has brought into focus the sameness in the difference between BJP and Congress. What a paradox :)

Misplaced Austerity drive a complete HOGWASH!

Ha! The austerity drive kick off is completely misplaced. It is not something the ministers need to do only during recession or drought period. They can continue doing it even in good times a la George Fernandes or Mamta Banerjee, who never made headlines for their austere living.

Neta's and their entourage are taking these drives only to the states where elections are due. This indicates a lot of unsaid things about the intent of the drive. I wonder why the change in heart has come at the very end of the recession. Or may be they wield so much power that once they started their drive, the recession has turned around and global stock exchanges have started to boom again!

They drive with their secretaries and black cats and sycophants in their Pajero's and Mercedes, then take a part of their travel in AC first class railway compartments and project as if have made a huge sacrifice. Such tokenism is a bigger insult to the masses who are reeling under drought and starvation. In Mahatma's land, a tokenism of this kind is a big insult to his teachings and his followers.

The arrogance of Sharad, Shashi and Sharma - for following simple ways of living alike their other billion plus cousins in this country - underlines the attitude with which the politicians look at the cattle class that we all form. They forget it is the cattle class that pays for their AC accommodations. Just as the cattle's are reared and used unabashedly, but worshiped intermittently, so is the case with people who are entitled to only vote not get them.

We have a law to restrict the number of cattle that can be put in a railway bogie while being transported. Alas! I hope the austerity drive helps somehow to get a law for the restriction of number of humans packed in a bogie as well. My challenge to Rahul Baba, take a train in Mumbai during peak hours in the direction of the rush in a Second Class compartment. Then your Dalit night-outs will have more legitimacy.

Abhishek Singhvi has sung paeans about Sonia Gandhi and is a perfect example of a sycophant. Sonia Gandhi would do good by cutting her entourage shorter. It will save a lot of money from the exchequer. The difference between business class ticket and economy class ticket is insignificantly miniscule compared to the wealth politicians have amassed from the exchequer.

One question we all seem to miss is, since Independence the Nehru Gandhi family has earned only the salary meant for the MP's or the salary of a Prime Minister. Even if we take into account that amount cumulatively. How on Earth can they spend on education abroad for all and still each claim to have crores and crores of 'White money' declared in their pre-election wealth declaration?

Although the act by Sonia Gandhi is a deviation from the norm, it does not deserve to be sung out in the form paeans and paeans of her 'sacrifice'. Other issues of importance should make headlines rather than this example for the projection of GOP as a peoples party.

Cosmetic tokenism is hogwash, true performance is the acid test. May be Congress knows where it stands in the elections after the consistent farmer suicides. So all these things follow.

_________ || GANAPATI BAPPA MORAYAA!!! || _________

वक्रतुंड महाकाय सूर्यकोटिसमप्रभ।
निर्विघ्नं कुरु मे देव सर्वकार्येषु सर्वदा॥

This is the video of the first Aarti of Ganapati Bappa at Lalbaugcha Raja which means 'King of Lalbaug'.

Lalbaugcha Raja started by the local fisherfolk has grown leaps and bounds into a major festivity. It is said that prayers offered to Ganpati Bappa at this place do not go unanswered. The collections are famous for anonymous contributors who deposit wads of crores of cash and sacks of jewellery in the Dakshina Peti or collection box after their wishes have been fulfilled.

The Lalbaugcha Raja Organisers conduct an auction of the festive deposits of fruits, coconuts, jewellery, Lords jewellery, etc; at the end of the festival, which staunch devotees are said to drive to humungous prices. A Coconut costing Rs.15/- offered at the festival and then auctioned by the organisers goes on to fetch thousands of rupees. The faith that the people have in this magnanimous festival is exceptional. The Organisers transparently, use the money collected from the festival towards charitable organisations and for helping the poor and needy.

'Lalbaugcha Raja' is a crowning glory for the Ganesh Festival in Mumbai.

For more details visit http://www.lalbaugcharaja.com