Manage basins to save lakes: Japanese experts

“Water bodies particularly lakes cannot be treated in isolation. Doing so will only render the conservation process futile. Management of the basin area of the lake is gradually gaining acceptance,” said Dr Mohan Kodarkar,an aquatic biologist from Hyderabad who is the only representative from South East Asia region to the ILEC. Dr Kodarkar is in Mumbai to attend a seminar on Thane creek that marks the World Wetland Day.

“A lake in isolation without the management of the basin area is merely a tank. That is what most of the lakes in urban areas have been reduced to. Tanks require regular external intervention for conservation. Whereas management of the basin of the lake by incorporating simple changes enables the lake environment to correct its own imbalances,” said Dr Kodarkar who has been engaged in the revival of Hussain Sagar Lake near Hyderabad. He added that in that sense famed Masunda Lake in Thane was merely a tank.

“There are no shorelines in most of the lakes in urban areas,water body is often encompassed by a wall. Shorelines play an important role in correcting the imbalances in the water. The shoreline with sands acts as a filter that removes the pollutants to some extent,” said Dr Kodarkar. He said that incorporation of a shoreline at the Hussain Sagar Lake is already giving good results. He said fisheries also helped in reducing the pollution in the lakes.

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“Integrated basin management for lakes focuses on assisting lake basin managers and stake holders in sustainable management of lakes and their basins,” said Dr Kodarkar. ILEC would draft an Integrated Lake Basin Management report for Ujjini Lake in Solapur and handing it over to the state government for its consideration.