With Vellayani lake, the second largest freshwater lake in the State after the Sasthamcottalake, slowly emerging as a source for piped water supply to urban and rural areas of the district, the focus is back on conservation of the lake. Encroachments over the years have shrunk the lake’s boundary.
Though in April 2013, the district panchayat unveiled its plan to revive the lake after the Department of Environment and Climate Change agreed to provide a sum of Rs.49. 4 lakh for restoration work, nothing concrete has evolved, except for releasing fishlings of different species worth around Rs.6 lakh and bio-fencing of certain areas of the lake.
The conservation work was mooted in 2007 after the VellayaniJagrathi Committee conducted a detailed study which found that sand-mining, encroachments and unauthorised constructions were posing threats to the lake, an important source of groundwater recharge.
Data available with the district panchayat reveals that the lake which once occupied an area of 441 hectares had now been reduced to just 250 hectares.
Former vice-president of the district panchayat and chairman of the Vellayani Lake Protection Committee, Rufus Daniel, said the conservation of the waterbody had become all the more important with the setting up of a major treatment plant.
Already, a 3-million litres per day plant for supplying water to the Vizhinjam International Multipurpose Deepwater Seaport is operational on the lake bed, he said.
“For all these years, the waterbody remained a source for groundwater recharge. Slowly the lake is becoming an important source for treated water. The authorities concerned should give prime importance to the conservation of the lake and take appropriate measures,” he said.
