Alappuzha school teacher’s green initiative features in PM Modi’s ‘Mann Ki Baat’ programme

Raphi Ramanath creates a herbal garden with more than 150 medicinal plants on the school campus. A second garden, based on Miyawaki technique, houses more than 450 trees of 115 species in five cents.

A schoolteacher’s relentless efforts to increase green cover found mention in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Mann Ki Baat’ programme on Sunday.

Raphi Ramanath, a biology teacher at Vignjana Vilasini Higher Secondary School (VVHSS), Thamarakulam in Alappuzha has created two green gardens on the campus. A herbal park spread over 25 cents is home to more than 150 medicinal plants and the second garden, which uses the Miyawaki method, houses over 450 trees of 115 species in five cents.

While urging the countrymen to use the Miyawaki technique, pioneered by Japanese botanist Akira Miyawaki, to increase green cover, the Prime Minister said that Mr. Ramanath had changed the scenario of an area with this method.

“Ramanath wanted to explain deeply about nature and the environment to his students. For this, he went to the extent of creating a herbal garden. His garden has now become a biodiversity zone. This success of his inspired him even more. After this, he grew a mini-forest with the Miyawaki technique and named it – ‘Vidyavanam’. Now only a teacher can come up with such a beautiful name – ‘Vidyavanam’. In the tiny space in this Vidyavanam, over 450 trees of 115 varieties were planted. His students also help him in their maintenance,” Mr. Modi said, adding that “Miyawaki forests can be easily grown anywhere, even in cities.”

Mr. Ramanath on Sunday said the Prime Minister’s mention of his efforts in the 102nd edition of the monthly radio programme would encourage people to take up initiatives to increase green cover and protect the environment. The Hindu had reported about Mr. Ramanath and his green initiatives in January 2022.

Mr. Ramanath, 42, who was not part of any conservation initiatives until he became coordinator of the school nature club, embarked on the mission to increase tree cover in 2009. Apart from creating two gardens at VVHSS, he helped create herbal/fruit gardens, butterfly gardens and nakshatra vanam (planting trees named after stars in the Malayalam calendar) in a number of schools, government offices, places of worship and so on over the years. In the process, the teacher whose vision is to increase green cover and inculcate environmental values in young minds, has planted or helped plant over one lakh saplings in Alappuzha and other parts of the State.

Mr. Ramanath won the best conservationist award of the Kerala State Biodiversity Board in 2015 and bagged the Vanamitra award of the Kerala Forest and Wildlife Department for his efforts to conserve the environment. He had organised protests against the practice of nailing signboards on trees. He produced a couple of documentaries as part of creating awareness on the importance of trees and biodiversity conservation.