Hyderabad: Nokia India on Thursday launched its ‘Take Back’ recycling initiative here as a part of the nationwide rollout of the program over 25 cities by year end.

The program is aimed at creating consumer awareness on the benefits of recycling old phones,chargers and accessories. The initiative aims at inducing behavioural change among Indian mobile users to recycle their used handsets in an environmentally sustainable way.

“Nokia will plant a tree sapling, for every handset dropped, irrespective of brand or model, into one of its recycling bins and also offer surprise gifts to the consumers. Globally, the Nokia Take-Back program has successfully been rolled out in over 85 countries with over 5000 recycling bins,” Ambrish Bakaya, director corporate affairs, Nokia India Ltd said..

Bakaya said that in India, the program was initially rolled out in Chennai and will soon be launched across Coimbatore, Bangalore, Pune, Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Kolkata, Guwahati, Bhubneshwar, Chandigrah, Jaipur, Dehradun, Ludhiana and Delhi.

Recycling bins have already been placed at over 1300 Nokia Priority Dealers and Nokia Care Centres nationally, he said.