Start of Tekdi was not a planned activity.... but like minded young people came togather and they started doing things which grew to form Tekdi organisation. Tekdi wasn't formed keeping very broad view. That time there was only one motto "Greening the Hills"  but, as members of Tekdi started working and studying on topics related environment; many socio-environmetal issues came up and was morally compelled to do work on those problems. Thereafter motto of Tekdi changed to Working towards greener future."                                                                             Since formation of the Tekdi Organisation, it has played vital role in many socio-environmental issues; not only in Pune city but outside Pune also. Here is a brief history of Tekdi, how it was formed, how it started working and how it expanded and progressed over the years.

How it was started –

>    Geocities (Summer 2001)
    A free geocities website was launched in order to create awareness about importance of Hills in the city. At that time the basic intention was only to create awareness & not of actually going all out & working on the hills. From discussions it was thought that something concrete should be done and then the barren slope was identified as a workplace. A phone network was established through friends to call people to work on Tekdi. The whole year 2001 was spent in gathering poeple, forming netowrk, trial and error on Law College hill etc   
  

YEAR 2002:  First Half (Starting from April to September)  

Onsite Work
>    The slope below the hanuman temple on law college hill was totally barren, and did not have any soil cover
>    There was absolutely no vegetation on the slopes.
>    A huge amount of soil was carried away during the monsoons.
>    It was decided that we should start the work and people will join to work       themselves.After starting the work, making of 3 bunds[june 2002](to               stop erosion).After first rain the bunds were filled by the soil and then           bunds were again extended.
>    After that we got information that from Sambhaji park we could get the       trees. We took and planted 25 accasia, 25 austrian babul, 50 glyricidia           plants. Total 70 trees survived through monsoon from them mostly were       glyricidia and Australian babul.But then because of ppl in slum below Tekdi       we lost 10 more plants. By end of year 60 trees survived.
>    Soil was brought from a friend's house and it was deposited on the slope.....
 Other projects
>    Parallel working on Tekdi website www.tekdi.org and got coverage in Indian express.
>    In winter, the need of water increased extensively as water table on Tekdi is very low. So we started watering       a tree[bottle of  life dec-jan 2002-03]
>    After this movement more ppl came to know about us and the india express article gave us a good exposure so           more and more people started to gather for work..

 YEAR 2002: Second Half (after monsoon)

>    In year 2002 it was basically infrastructure work. Garud kaka, Arun kadakodi provided us with the means of           infrastructure.
>    A tank was installed near apla maruti mandir. (nov-dec 2002) There was one problem       that people used to climb the slope from any route, what we did that we decided           one route to ascend and it was marked by white stones.
>    For protection of bunds and plants we installed barbed wire fence. It was not large       one but that helped a lot in reducing destruction.
>    To fight with evergrowing plastic garbage problem we conducted several plastic           collection drives on Tekdi.
>    In this year there was very less rain in pune so survival of plants was a very critical       problem. Because of this watering the existing and new plants became a task in               itself.
>    "OutoSavePune Yahoo Group" was created to contact poeple and to spread                       awareness .

YEAR 2003: First half (till June)

>    Pre plantation and pre-monsoon activities like making dithes for new plantation, repairing the bunds, making           "ali" around last year planted trees, clrearing grass where new                       plantation was supposed to take place etc.                                                   >    Watering the planted trees was a regular ritual now.
>    Tekdi Chatushrungi branch was formed with the initiative of a dynamic         tekdian Yogesh Saynakar. We started working on Chantushrungi                   (behind Devi's temple) along with the work on Law college hill. With the           help of "Devasthan Trust-Chatushrungi", Tekdi Chatushrungi was able to       plant and maintain over 300 trees.                                                              >    In January 03, there was an article in newspapers about an ammendment       in development plan giving more  FSI on hilltops and hill slopes (increased       the FSI from 4% to 8%). An organization named "Green Hills" decided to           take some signature movement against this ammendment(which in                  reality didn't took place) but because of this our member Parth Lawate           got triggered. He started an email movement. At the end of day 1 there       were more than 400 people opposing the ammendment. By day 10,                   number crossed count of 5000 and at the end of fortnight number                   reached up to 7000..
>    This email campaign gained attention of media and many people became       aware of the crawling danger. This issue       was then studied by tekdi           members.
>    After that some people gathered together who were really concerned           about this problem. A meeting took place in "Kamala Nehru park". After           discussing some ideas, finally we arrived to a solution. It was decided           that we should protest legally. Hence we launched a large scale signature       campaign. We came on road, convincing citizens about the problem and       getting forms filled along with signature/suggestions. We collected more       than 90,000 signatures in a month working only evenings. The office was       be-sieged by protests and finally the point was taken by administration           that poeple dont want hills to be eaten-up by builders.
>    A weekly event called Katta was conducted during those days by "In               search". A presentation was given on Traffic problems on Katta.
>    A compost pit was prepared near hanuman mandir in summer.We got               good soil  from that pit for our plants and it helped us in improving                   condition of our plants.

Year 2003: Second Half (After June)

>    We started a project called "Adopt a tree." The response for this project       was very good. The concept was that those who can not come regularly       on hills to help in maintaining trees; they can pay money equal to                   expenses  which would require for a tree throughout the year.                   >    An event called Green Week was held at Agriculture college by an                      organisation called "Kisan". Tekdi was offered a stall. We used this as             platform to reach upto more ppl.

Onsite work:
>    In august we did a project with Tata-Johnson. 35 trees 3 bunds.
>    There were several trees planted near parking with nobody to take care       of and on the verge of dying; we took proper care of those trees.
>    We also did plantation with Aranywak. We invited "Sundarlal Bahuguna"           for plantation event.
>    Old works continued like painting stones with chuna, repairing barbed       wire fence, repairing bunds, making  water channels, diverting water           flows into bunds etc.
>    As an experiment we used Neem Leaves as pesticides to protect plants       from pests. It showed good result.
>    During winter and  summer we used to put dry remains of Vegetables           from different Bhajiwalas  in plants to provide for some organic                     matter and also to maintain moisture.
           
Sustained means of Income:
>    By this time there were many projects in our plans but do not have               enough funds to support them. So to gather funds we started a daughter       branch called "Trekdi". We started conducting treks and profit from               treks we used for Tekdi works.
>    Nature Walks on Tekdi.
>    Also we started merchandising T-shirts and caps.       

     
YEAR 2004: First Half (till June)

>     Soil in Pashan lake was extracted in Jan 04. That soil was of very good quality. We brought almost a tempo load        and deposited that soils in the bunds. That helped in increasing fertility of soil and seed bank.
>     On 14th feb 2004, Valentines day, we did plantation with Earth Links. The specialty of this project was that            now first time all the plants used for plantation were indigenous varieties.
>     Watering all the plants was now a major task. We had more than 250 plants and they need watering as the                strata in which they were planted was very poor. The water resource was very critical and expensive. Hence        to save water(ultimately reducing the expenditure on water tankers) we introduced Drip watering System.            That system helped a limited area. But after some weeks, pipes used for drip watering system was stolen.
>     In order to create a stable online base; in January 2004 we started  beta version of portal. That provided a                platform for tekdi lovers all over the world to discuss on different environmental issues.
>     The portal was re-launched in April 04 with full working features and was an instant success. 
>     On Chatushrungi branch we installed a water tank with the help and sponsership of "Devasthan trust."
>     The "Balbharti - MIT" road issue started popping up. A road 100-ft-wide,        truly destructive to the environment - cutting through the forest and            hill was proposed and tenders were issued. In projects as large as                   these, surely the public must have some say ? But no. By invoking Section        205 of the Municipal Corporations Act, the PMC is trying to use a legal            loophole to foist its ill-conceived notions on the public, whether they like        it or not. Still we conducted a signature cammpaign that helped us to            judge that there are many people who dont support this road.

Year 2004: Second Half (After June)

>     By this monsoon because of protection and bunds soil layer on the Law college slope was imporved, hence the        monsoon was particularly used for extensive plantations. 
>     In July 2004- 30 Trees were planted
>     22 August 2004 with Rotary DSK- 50 Plants (all indigenous variety)                    were planted.
>     At Chaturshringi, Plantation was carried out on 15th August 2004. 35            Trees were planted.
>     Route to temple was again repaired by arranging stones like stairs.
>     Channeling was done to divert water flows into bunds. That helped  a lot        in order to save precious soil and increasing water contect into bunds            and ultimately that resulted in healthy growth of trees. More than 90%        surface running water was saved and accumulated in bunds.
>     Slide Show at Nature Walk Katta regarding the Road issue,
>     By this time it was understood that till public is aware about environment it is impossible to bring out a change        so we started reaching out to public telling them about "Sustainable development and environmental friendly            solutions".
>     Sponsoring the eco prize in at Shahu college Of Engg’s State Level Paper Presentation competition.
>     Traffic problems were becoming severe and state of public transport ie PMT was becoming poorer. Ultimately              we understood that the lust of eating hills will not rest till traffic problem is solved and traffic problem can be            solved only by improving public transport system. And hence we started studying/working voluntarily with                organisations like PTTF (pune traffic and transport forum), Parisar, CDSA (center for developmental studies                and avtivities. We got exellent guides to help in studies like Sujit Patwardhan, Aneeta Gokhle Beninger, Anil                kelkar, Dr.Uday Kulkarni. etc. They helped us a lot in understanding the issues thoroughly.

(This page is still under construction.............)