“They make fun of me, call me crazy. Some of them tell me to clean their drains. Some call me ‘naala saaf karne wala’.”. For Bittu from Biawara in Madhya Pradesh, this is a daily reality. Colloquially known as Bittu Tabahi, the 20-year-old made waves on social media after a video of him stepping into the heavily polluted Ajanar river and pulling out waste with his bare hands went viral.. However, he says, whenever he steps out to clean a littered or polluted area, he becomes a spectacle for the very people he is trying to help. “Whenever I sit by the river, they throw garbage right in front of me,” he says. “If I stop them, they are ready to fight.”. The rise of the “cleanfluencer” in India has made this paradox even clearer. These are people who record the process of cleaning up public places like rivers, ghats, streets, and parks. A lot of people on the Internet like their videos, which often show dramatic before-and-after changes. But their presence also shows that society is uncomfortable with people who show responsibility.. Bittu’s journey began on January 26 when he decided to stop waiting for the government to fix things and start cleaning the river himself.. “I wanted to make a machine to clean the river, but I didn’t have the money. I am a student,” he says. “So I thought, I will clean as much as I can with my own hands.” Since then, he has spent hours every day removing garbage from a 500-metre stretch, often without basic protective gear. The effort has taken a physical toll. “I got infections. The skin on my hands and feet started coming off,” he tells indianexpress.com.. View this post on Instagram. Support, however, has been scarce. “We haven’t received any help,” he says. “People don’t stop littering. I have even put a dustbin there, but they don’t use it.” Instead, he more often encounters disbelief and mockery. “They say, what is this river to you? Why are you doing this?”. The viral video. And yet, this same work recently gained attention on social media when industrialist Anand Mahindra shared a video of Bittu on X. In the video, Bittu is seen wading through filth, dragging out plastic, algae, and debris from a river in his city. The video went viral, earning praise and admiration. But the attention also brought back a familiar accusation, that he was doing this “for likes and views.”. Story continues below this ad. In a country where civic sense is one of the most discussed topics on social media, this discomfort stands out. Videos of people littering, defacing public property, or ignoring basic hygiene norms frequently go viral, sparking outrage and debate. Trends mocking “zero civic sense” regularly dominate timelines. Yet, when individuals step in to address these very issues on the ground, the response is often sceptical or hostile.. Delhi-based environmental content creator Sonali Singh sees this contradiction up close. For her, documenting clean-up drives is
