The Lakes Are No More Stoic

There is a Lake Development Authority which looks into conservation and rejuvenation, but its role is not well defined vis-a-vis other government bodies. Most water bodies come under the forest department, the revenue department, the city corporation (BMP) or the city development authority (BDA). The government now says that it may hand over lake maintenance to BDA or BMP. Lakes in the city are, after all, not merely for beautification, they are integral to its functioning. One newspaper columnist compared them to kidneys: "If the city's gardens and tree-cover were lungs, the inter-connected lakes played the role of kidneys, flushing out excess water when the city gets soaked to the bones."

M. Shashidhar Reddy, member of the National Disaster Management Authority set up recently by the prime minister, said the body would look into these man-made disasters and highlight this issue when the National Plan is prepared. "Tanks and lakes were an essential part of the ecosystem. They had the inbuilt capacity to take on nature's fury when it rained heavily," he told Outlook. "But encroachment of the tanks and lakes have destroyed the eco-chain. The flooding caused by heavy rains is not limited to Bangalore; we have this disaster waiting to happen in almost all key cities in India."