Gobar Times

Gobar Times

First Issue, May, 1998
Categories	Children's Environment Magazine
Frequency	Monthly
First issue	May 1998
Company	Centre for Science and Environment
Country	India
Based in	New Delhi
Language	English
Website	Gobar Times - Official Website Centre for Science and Environment- Official Website

Gobar Times is a monthly environmental education magazine for the young adult, published by the Centre for Science and Environment. It is published along with Down to Earth as a supplement. The magazine was first published in May, 1998 and has widespread circulation across India and abroad. The icon of the magazine, Pandit Gobar Ganesh, the pondering panditji is an Indian elderly who takes the reader through current issues, subjects and ideas relating to the environment. He is the icon whose brains can be picked for anything on earth. The current editor of the magazine is Sumita Dasgupta.

"Gobar" is the Hindi and Nepali word for cow dung." It was chosen to capture the eco-philosophy and tradition of generating wealth from waste. Waste gobar serves as an insecticide and is used to plaster mud houses and is a waterproof coating for walls. It is also used to plaster floors to keep them cool. Gobar is the energy source for rural India. It is used as cooking fuel where people have no access to fuels like LPG. The greatest use of cow dung in India is in farming where it is used as natural manure for farmers' crops. In short, it's a mainstay of rural India, and an appropriate symbol for eco-friendly technology.

Anil Agarwal the founder-director of Centre for Science and Environment, India’s leading environmental NGO, aptly called ‘Gobar’ the symbol that embodies the spirit of the Indian environmental movement. As he correctly reflected, the widespread and diverse use of gobar in Indian society stands up to every principle of good environmentalism.

In May 1992, the Society for Environmental Communications started India’s only science and environment fortnightly, Down To Earth (DTE). Over the years the magazine has informed and inspired people about environmental threats facing India and the world - a dimension underplayed in mainstream media. In May, 1998, Gobar Times was first published as a supplement to DTE. Gobar Times reaches out to the young, encouraging them to take the lead and make a difference. It informs them and encourages them to save the environment by becoming an action-oriented, knowledgeable and aware community. The tone of the magazine is light-hearted, simple and thought-provoking. Every month the magazine comes up with an activity related center spread which can be pulled out and put up as a poster to encourage readers to become active participants. The magazine has recently entered into a partnership with the leading newspaper Hindustan Times. Readers can now get a glimpse of what Pandit Gobar Ganesh has to say as they read HTNext.