From owning four cars to cycling to work today — besides motivating hundreds of others to do so in order to beat the hike in fuel prices — it has been a long journey for Prabhakar ‘GoGreen’ Rao.
On Sundays, a group of cyclists calling itself the Go Green Initiative or GGI starts pedalling off from south Bangalore, crosses Lalbagh West Gate, Hudson Circle and Minerva Circle and cycles right across the city to the library in Cubbon Park; most Sundays, the group ends up at a fellow-cyclist’s home for a cup of fresh filter coffee.
On Sunday, June 4, the group had a special cause to espouse; today’s nation-wide bandh in protest of the fuel price rise was a perfect opportunity to encourage people to use bicycles instead of fuel-guzzling cars and bikes.
The filter coffee is important, and not just because you need some caffeine to recharge your batteries after huffing and puffing your way on a bike through 8-9 km, says Prabhakar Rao, founder of GGI.
“Sometimes, families of cyclists need convincing that this is not some new fad. When they see that there are so many other people involved in this initiative, they become more open to the idea of cycling and letting family members use their cycles,” says Rao, better known by the moniker GoGreen Rao today (even his Facebook page uses that name).
Rao says he perfectly understands family resistance, having faced it first-hand when he was converted to the cycling cult two years ago after watching the rousing environmental documentary An Inconvenient Truth, which made Rao sit up and take notice of the various ways in which we were harming and depleting the natural environment.
Rao used to be a passionate lover of motor vehicles — he owned four cars and a bike. A top-level executive of a leading garment manufacturing company based in Bangalore, Rao had a busy, stressful lifestyle and a reputation to maintain. His family was aghast at his plans to cycle to work; they initially looked at it as climbing down the success ladder.
But one fine day, he fetched up at work in a cycle, and has not looked back since. The Go Green Go Cycling group started by him with six people has 600-plus members today. “There are new signups every day. Awareness about cycling’s benefits for the environment and for individuals has grown phenomenally in the last two years,” says Rao, who lost 20kg since he started cycling regularly. He has sold off his once-beloved bike and two of his cars have been so infrequently used that the batteries have run down. He plans to sell them soon.
Cycling has even taught Rao some important life lessons, including a management mantra. “It has taught me to go slow. We work in highly charged environments where we are taught that we have to react instantly. After I started cycling, I realised the benefits of slowing down and stepping back,” says Rao, who continues to work at his demanding day job. He has ambitious plans for the Go Green Initiative. The group has already set up operations in Hyderabad and has plans to expand to Mumbai, Pune and Chennai.
To make the lives of current adopters easier, the group’s website provides information on a variety of topics, including advice on the best cycles to buy for age, weight, height and fitness levels. “I want to make things easier for those starting today,” says Rao.
To learn more about Rao and GGI, log on to http://www.gogreengocycling.org
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