Malgudi series - 12
In the recent months there is an impeccable coverage of the two infamous lakes of bengaluru both in national and international media. One is Varthur and another bellandur lake. They were quite serene till the time multi storied apartments were built around them starting year 2000 and sold to prospective buyers promising them a majestic sunrise and sunset amidst lake view !
What happened all of a sudden is rather a cliched question !
According to sources bellandur lake is the largest lake in the city with an area of 892 acres and use to have a very good ecosystem. Its indigenous wildlife had Parakeets, King cobras, Kingfishers,Parrots, wood pigeons, rat snakes, monitor lizards etc. which are not visible at all today !
They did not vanish all of a sudden but only due to the continuous, unplanned and fast paced urbanization over the past 20 odd years with sewage from the surroundings being fed to these fresh water lakes without any treatment. All we can see today in these lakes today is water hyacinth and no other flora and fauna !
The overflow from bellandur lake flows into Varthur lake which is the second largest lake in bengaluru with an area of 445 acres and was a man made lake built by ganga kings thousands of years ago. Today it receives 40 % of sewage from bengaluru and led to the massive growth of water hyacinth which reduces the BOD ( Biological oxygen demand ) of water leading to death of aquatic life. The high levels of phosphates ( In detergents) and ammonia (In floor cleaning chemicals) which enters the lakes via sewer are causing a lot of foam when water flows down from a height especially near varthur kodi ( An overfill outlet for any lake is called KODI in kannada ) leading to FLY FOAM all over the vicinity. Till this happened and affected people who travel in the Whitefield main road, no one noticed and took it seriously !
A study by IISC reveals that 2 TMC of untreated water to Tamil Nadu goes from here through pinakini river basin and at the same time there is a significant amount of heavy metal content in the milk produced by the cattle which feed on the grass and water hyacinth grown in the lake's vicinity !
Bellandur lake with its heavy organic sewer content had a lot of methane ( Marsh gas) which is generally the case in low oxygen environment (anaerobic ) when such methane was exposed to heat from sun and atmospheric oxygen it caught fire which we generally observe in municipal dumps or coal mines !
People were really worried and thought the situation must be way out of control if water has to catch fire and only then the authorities responded despite continuous warnings from institutes of repute like Indian institute of science ( IISC ) and several other citizen forums regarding the untreated sewage, foaming, Industrial pollution ( Around 100 industries near bellandur), Eutrophication (Excessive growth of algae and other phyto planktons due to increase in nutrients like detergents, fertilizers entering water bodies).
The situation in bengaluru is far worse than we perceive because for saving trees, lakes and other eco systems, citizens have had to approach Government, Green Tribunal and courts which is really a shame to the name Garden city ! The lung spaces of the city like lalbhag and cubbon parks have long been encroached by greedy citizens and key people from the government itself.
The situation in other lakes of bengaluru is no different from what happened to varthur or bellandur lakes except the fact that there is no fire incident yet. Although there are a lot of foaming incidents, the first one to reveal foaming was the lake near tin factory bus stand ( KR Puram) which is completely covered by water hyacinth now !
In all the developed nations there is a concept called "Polluter Pays Principle-PPP" where the one who pollutes will be shamed and hefty fines will be collected from him, but in our country we citizens are collectively polluting our own water bodies with a blind eye towards the consequences and get extremely active and uneasy when situation goes out of control, but by that time we would have reached a point of no return !
Sources : Wikipedia, Newspaper articles, Author's own observation
In the recent months there is an impeccable coverage of the two infamous lakes of bengaluru both in national and international media. One is Varthur and another bellandur lake. They were quite serene till the time multi storied apartments were built around them starting year 2000 and sold to prospective buyers promising them a majestic sunrise and sunset amidst lake view !
What happened all of a sudden is rather a cliched question !
According to sources bellandur lake is the largest lake in the city with an area of 892 acres and use to have a very good ecosystem. Its indigenous wildlife had Parakeets, King cobras, Kingfishers,Parrots, wood pigeons, rat snakes, monitor lizards etc. which are not visible at all today !
They did not vanish all of a sudden but only due to the continuous, unplanned and fast paced urbanization over the past 20 odd years with sewage from the surroundings being fed to these fresh water lakes without any treatment. All we can see today in these lakes today is water hyacinth and no other flora and fauna !
The overflow from bellandur lake flows into Varthur lake which is the second largest lake in bengaluru with an area of 445 acres and was a man made lake built by ganga kings thousands of years ago. Today it receives 40 % of sewage from bengaluru and led to the massive growth of water hyacinth which reduces the BOD ( Biological oxygen demand ) of water leading to death of aquatic life. The high levels of phosphates ( In detergents) and ammonia (In floor cleaning chemicals) which enters the lakes via sewer are causing a lot of foam when water flows down from a height especially near varthur kodi ( An overfill outlet for any lake is called KODI in kannada ) leading to FLY FOAM all over the vicinity. Till this happened and affected people who travel in the Whitefield main road, no one noticed and took it seriously !
A study by IISC reveals that 2 TMC of untreated water to Tamil Nadu goes from here through pinakini river basin and at the same time there is a significant amount of heavy metal content in the milk produced by the cattle which feed on the grass and water hyacinth grown in the lake's vicinity !
Bellandur lake with its heavy organic sewer content had a lot of methane ( Marsh gas) which is generally the case in low oxygen environment (anaerobic ) when such methane was exposed to heat from sun and atmospheric oxygen it caught fire which we generally observe in municipal dumps or coal mines !
People were really worried and thought the situation must be way out of control if water has to catch fire and only then the authorities responded despite continuous warnings from institutes of repute like Indian institute of science ( IISC ) and several other citizen forums regarding the untreated sewage, foaming, Industrial pollution ( Around 100 industries near bellandur), Eutrophication (Excessive growth of algae and other phyto planktons due to increase in nutrients like detergents, fertilizers entering water bodies).
The situation in bengaluru is far worse than we perceive because for saving trees, lakes and other eco systems, citizens have had to approach Government, Green Tribunal and courts which is really a shame to the name Garden city ! The lung spaces of the city like lalbhag and cubbon parks have long been encroached by greedy citizens and key people from the government itself.
The situation in other lakes of bengaluru is no different from what happened to varthur or bellandur lakes except the fact that there is no fire incident yet. Although there are a lot of foaming incidents, the first one to reveal foaming was the lake near tin factory bus stand ( KR Puram) which is completely covered by water hyacinth now !
In all the developed nations there is a concept called "Polluter Pays Principle-PPP" where the one who pollutes will be shamed and hefty fines will be collected from him, but in our country we citizens are collectively polluting our own water bodies with a blind eye towards the consequences and get extremely active and uneasy when situation goes out of control, but by that time we would have reached a point of no return !
Sources : Wikipedia, Newspaper articles, Author's own observation
