Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan participated in the 'Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam 3.0' plantation drive at PM SHRI Kendriya Vidyalaya No. 1, Delhi Cantonment, on World Environment Day, 5 June 2026, planting a sapling and interacting with students on environmental conservation.

Context

Posting on X, the Minister described the event as reflecting 'our shared commitment to honour Mother Nature, express gratitude to our mothers and contribute to a greener future for Bharat.' He noted that students' 'awareness, enthusiasm and sense of responsibility towards environmental conservation inspire confidence in India's sustainable future.'

World Environment Day is observed annually on 5 June under the coordination of the United Nations Environment Programme. India has consistently used the occasion for large-scale afforestation drives, often involving ministers, students, and community organisations.

Policy Backdrop

The Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam campaign — translating as 'One Tree in Mother's Name' — was first rolled out nationally in 2024, with subsequent annual editions encouraging citizens to plant saplings as a tribute to their mothers. The 3.0 edition continues this tradition, embedding the drive within an emotional and cultural register that the central government has used to broaden participation beyond institutional targets.

The venue, PM SHRI Kendriya Vidyalaya No. 1, is part of the PM Schools for Rising India (PM SHRI) scheme approved by the Union Cabinet in 2022 to develop 14,500 model schools — including select Kendriya Vidyalayas — with emphasis on experiential learning, which now explicitly includes environmental education. Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan (KVS), the central body running these schools primarily for children of defence and government employees, is a key institutional partner in such drives.

The event also carried the #MissionLiFE tag, referencing the Lifestyle for Environment initiative announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at COP26 in Glasgow in 2021 and formally launched in 2022. Mission LiFE emphasises individual behavioural change and sustainable daily habits as complements to regulatory climate policy.

Stakeholders and Impact

School students at the Delhi Cantonment campus were the immediate participants, engaging directly with the minister during what he described as an 'enriching interaction.' The Kendriya Vidyalaya network, spread across the country, serves as a scalable platform for rolling out such campaigns simultaneously to a large student population.

Tree plantation drives around World Environment Day have been a fixture of central government programming since at least 2014, forming part of India's commitments under its Nationally Determined Contributions to the Paris Agreement, which include expanding forest and tree cover to create an additional carbon sink.

What's Next

The broader Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam 3.0 drive is expected to see participation across PM SHRI schools and other institutions nationwide through the current season. Analysts and civil society groups have flagged that tracking sapling survival rates from earlier editions remains a key measure of whether plantation targets translate into durable green cover. The Education Ministry's integration of environmental campaigns into the PM SHRI school framework signals that such drives are likely to become a recurring feature of the academic calendar going forward.