Bengaluru: Stating that it is ‘not happy’ with the authorities for ‘shirking their respective responsibilities’ in rejuvenating Bellandur lake, the Karnataka High Court on Monday appointed Principal Secretaries of the Urban Development and Environment Departments as special officers to take remedial measures.
The court has given the special officers four weeks to look into the status of the lake as well as take remedial measures to restore and rejuvenate it.
A Division Bench comprising Chief Jusice Subhro Kamal Mukherjee and Justice Budihal R.B. passed the interim order on a PIL petition filed in December 2015 by D. Kupendra Reddy, a Rajya Sabha member. The petitioner had sought directions from the court to the authorities to clean the polluted lake while complaining about laxity by the authorities in preventing the lake from being polluted.
“The lake is polluted. The pollutants are required to be removed and the lake should be rejuvenated and maintained properly. On the last few occasions, we found that the authorities are shirking their respective responsibilities. We are not happy,” the bench observed in its order as the authorities, including the BDA and the BBMP, have not responded to its queries.
In August last year, the court had restrained the BDA and the BBMP from granting sanction for new projects in and around Bellandur lake, within BBMP limits, without following the circular issued by the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board in 2007 for securing consent from the Board for certain types of projects.
