Coimbatore: When most of the water bodies in Coimbatore are brimming and overflowing with surplus water, thanks to the monsoon rains, a lake located outside the city has been facing the brunt of encroachment for many years near Malumichampatti.
Coimbatore: When most of the water bodies in Coimbatore are brimming and overflowing with surplus water, thanks to the monsoon rains, a lake located outside the city has been facing the brunt of encroachment for many years near Malumichampatti.
The lake located at the Seerapalayam Village in Madukkarai Union is dumped with domestic and industrial waste which has transformed the lake from a water body to a dump yard. The water body is deprived of any source of water inflow for more than three years.
According S. Sadhasivam from Aaru Paadhukaappu Kuzhu, the lake was initially spread over 16 acres and was a major water feeding system to 1000 acres of farmland.
“It was initially fed by 1500 acres of catchment area, which are now totally arid and disturbed heavily by humans,” he noted.
He further added that over the period of time, people started to dump wastes on the lake, thus reducing the lake area drastically.
“Presently, water can stagnate only upto three acres, whereas the actual lake size was 16 acres. It is being further reduced by waste dumping. If one looks at the lake, it would not look like a water body but would rather look like a dump yard filled with domestic, industrial and debris waste,” he lamented.
Claiming that more than 50 villages depend on the lake for ground water recharge, he pondered that the lake now hosts upto 500 tons of waste.
“Even the panchayat is dumping their wastes here. We have complained to the district officials on numerous occasions, yet no action has been taken so far,” he alleged.
Reacting to the issue, Ruban Shankar Raja, Project Director of the District Rural Development Agency (DRDA) said that stern actions would be initiated to save the lake.
“The first action would be to stop the dumping. We need to find an alternate dumping yard to segregate the waste and improve the lake,” he added.