Lake view: A matter of life and death

Lake view: A matter of life and death
The Times of India
Tonnes of fish floated in Vengaiana Kere lake recently. Months ago Ulsoor Lake witnessed a similar tragedy. Paawana Poonacha finds out the reasons and results of these eco-disasters from Lake Development Authority CEO B.K. Singh.


Since LDA is the sole custodian of lakes in the state, how could a slip-up be allowed at Vengaiana Kere? Besides, the lake was hitherto known as one of LDA’s best managed lakes in Bangalore.
Since its inception in July 2002, LDA has been an umbrella organisation for various civic agencies which take up lake restoration works. Although we are not sole custodians of all lakes, LDA is partly responsible for the Vengaiana Kere mishap.
The vent provided to divert sewage at the National Highway at K.R. Puram was damaged during road expansion. After my personal inspection at the spot LDA shot off a letter to national highway authorities two months ago asking them to provide funds to install more pipes to divert sewage across the length of the expanded road. There has been no response to the letter till date. Locals have taken advantage of the situation and further damaged the pipes. The vent was damaged, due to which sewage was entering the lake.

A similar disaster occurred at Ulsoor Lake a few months ago. How did LDA respond to it?
Ulsoor Lake was neither owned or developed by us. The onus was on the BCC. When the mishap occurred at Ulsoor, LDA followed the investigation process. The LDA has devised a concept of lake wardens who will be in charge of monitoring the lakes. Currently there are four wardens for a dozen lakes. We are in the process of inviting more stakeholders into our effort. Now Ulsoor has a lake warden too.

But is there no proper system in place where LDA could conduct periodic checks on the management and maintenance of restored lakes?
LDA conducts quarterly review meetings with all stakeholder civic agencies. Sometimes stakeholders do not strictly adhere to the decisions of the meetings. Total compliance should take a while as our organisation is fairly new.

Are there lessons to be learnt from the past mistakes?
We want to step up our efforts to create awareness among stakeholders and individuals and resident groups. We want them to be more vigilant, fight out land sharks and maintain restored lakes. We want to drum up efforts on LDA’s Adopt-a-lake programme.

How many lakes in the city have been restored since LDA’s inception? How many are in the pipeline?
Thirty of the city’s 262 lakes have been restored so far including the nine lakes since LDA came into being. Proposals for a few more in the city are underway.

In the DOCK
Name: B.K. Singh CEO, Lake Development Authority
Date of Birth: July 1, 1953
Address: 12th Floor, Public Utility Building, M G Road, Bangalore — 560001
Phone: 25590098/97
Educational qualification: MSc (Physics) IFS (1976 batch).
After serving as managing director of Karnataka State Forests Industries Corporation and for a brief period as Chief Conservator of Forests, Western Ghats, Singh took over as Lake Development Authority chief executive officer on January 1, 2005. “Presently, I work with a staff strength of five people,” he says, speaking about the Authority’s inability to physically monitor restoration and maintenance of all existing lakes in the state. In the four-and-a-half months that he’s been with LDA, Singh has approved funding from the ministry for environment and forests for three lakes in the state — Gulbarga, Haveri, Hassan. The Vengaiana Kere crisis resulting in the death of tonnes of fish was rather unfortunate, “Our mistake,” he admits, adding, “The damage control has been immediate.”

VERDICT BENEFIT OF DOUBT


H C Sharatchandra, environment consultant, former environment secretary
I agree that the Lake Development Authority is not the sole agency for restoration and management of lakes. However, LDA was formed by the government in a knee-jerk reaction. The roles and responsibilities of the organisation did not get adequate mention. Maintenance of water bodies and water quality is the responsibility of the department of environment and forests, and the Pollution Control Board. Nevertheless, having spent huge amounts of money, the LDA should have been more vigilant in preventing the mishap. Merely writing letters and waiting for the national highway authorities to respond does not help.

This mishap seems to be a failure on the part of the government. Generally, state-owned agencies are violators of environment norms. As per the Water Act, the Pollution Control Board and the Department of Environment had all the powers to act as per law. To that extent, I’d say, LDA does not have sufficient teeth.

Another glaring problem as far as water bodies are concerned, is that there are too many agencies dealing with water bodies. All we need is a well developed policy which will be able to firmly initiate action against violators.