Lowering AC temp from 28 to 20°C is aiyaashi, Wangchuk tells youth

Why lower air-conditioner temperature from a comfortable 28-degree setting to 20 degree? Ye aiyaashi kyun.. (Why this extravagance?), said environmentalist and educationist Sonam Wangchuk (58), rebuking youngsters who thronged the Sector 38 gurdwara to listen to his talk on climate.

Like devotees in a crowded hall, they sat patiently on a naked floor for two hours, occasionally catching a glimpse of ceiling fans on full throttle, while the ACs were kept off.

His solution to rising traffic

Be on your bicycles, be on your feet and you will keep one less car on the road, a little less traffic jam. And if many follow this practice, there will be a nice and clean city with no traffic jams. — Sonam Wangchuk

"Take a cotton sheet and keep the quilt aside for a while," the ribbing continued only the target changed, "I always carry one... these days even hotel rooms do not have them."

In Chandigarh for his two-day stopover during the Delhi Chalo Padyatra from Leh to Rajghat in New Delhi (September 1 to October 2), the Ladakh innovator and 2018 Ramon Magsaysay award winner sounded a bit envious over the city green cover. “A very beautiful city, very special in that it has a bicycle track. But what is most surprising is that I have not seen a single cyclist on it,” he said with a rude face.

When pointed out that extreme hot and cold weather for most part of the year keeps the cyclists away, Wangchuk asked, “Is it colder than Ladakh here? We do cycle there in such conditions.”

Besides extreme weather conditions, bad street-lighting, road cave-ins and a hostile attitude of road users toward cyclists prohibits “cyclegiri” here. “That is something we need to look into,” he said.

Wangchuk said the electricity produced in hills is drowning our houses and taking away livelihood, but in cities, people are wasting it.

He, along with others, are holding the “Delhi Chalo” march to demand constitutional safeguards for Ladakh under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution and raise the alarm over fragile Himalayan region. Around 200 activists, who are putting up in the gurdwara, say the environmental degradation to the eternal water source impacts not just Ladakh but also the entire country.

“You don’t have to walk like us from Leh to Chandigarh if only you walk to your office from your home and back, or to your school, college and back on bicycles. You can do a lot to your city and environment,” said Wangchuk.

Explaining his rationale regarding his demand for safeguards for Ladakh under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution, he said, “We do not want officials with parachutes who come for three years and vanish. We want autonomy and self-governance for the indigenous people.”