Most people who pass the sprawling, dry piece of land overgrown with shrubs and thorny bushes on their way to the Samanar Hills or the Temple at Keelakuyil Kudi don’t realise that the place is actually a water tank.
“Many people aren’t even aware of the existence of Mailendhal tank. A few scholars have pointed out references to the tank in ‘Kandapuranam’,” said the members of Wake Up Madurai.
The 63-acre tank near Nagamalai Pudukottai is a picture of neglect and lies filled with silt and covered with thorny buses, shrubs and ‘Karuvelam’ trees. An awareness programme was organised at the tank by ‘Wake Up Madurai’ on Sunday morning to sensitise the local residents and the general public to the different facts about the tank.
While most of the tank bed is clean and free of garbage, there is a need to deepen the bed and clear the vast growth of ‘Karuvelam’ trees there since they absorb a lot of groundwater. About 30-odd people who attended the awareness programme picked up sickles and cleared ‘Karuvelam’ trees to some extent. “Thirty years ago, the place used to be surrounded by farmlands”, says A. Rajasundaram, a resident of Malayan Nagar in Vadivelkarai panchayat where the tank is located. The tank is presently surrounded by independent houses, and more houses are under construction.
“As educational institutions came up in the surrounding areas, people slowly started building houses and settling here considering its proximity to schools and colleges,” he says. “When there is adequate rainfall, the tank retains a bit of water but not for too many days,” said M. Kalyani, a resident of a nearby area. “While the run-off water from the hills during the monsoon is collected and filled in the tank, all the water inlets to the tank have been blocked due to encroachments and accumulation of silt,” she says.
