It’s peak summer, but the lake in Red Hills, which is one of the city’s primary drinking water source, continues to receive inflows of a different kind. It is sewage, illegally released from various points in the lake’s periphery.
Residents of Ambattur complain that some of the houses and commercial establishments that do not have a drainage connection illegally let out sewage onto the lake bed. Residents of Vinayagapuram in Retteri said sewage is being released into various points along the Ambattur Red Hills Road and parts of Gandhi Nagar, Nallur panchayat near the canal that is used to bring water from Cholavaram lake.
As most of the areas around the lake are yet to be covered with underground drainage network, water bodies have turned easy prey to release sewage.
A 20-team of Arappor Iyakkam, a citizen’s group, recently initiated a civic audit on the issues affecting the lake. The reservoir in Red Hills has only 11 % of storage of its total capacity of 3,300 million cubic feet.
Chandra Mohan, a member of the team, said “We found that raw sewage was being released into the lake’s periphery through stormwater drain from West and East Balaji Nagar, Kallikuppam. As the area that falls under Ambattur zone does not have a drainage network, many households find it convenient to link sewage into SWD that finally drains into the Red Hills lake.”
Though the lake bed in the periphery is dry, puddles of sewage cover a portion of the water body along Ambattur Red Hills Road, team members said. The team also found that several vehicles were excavating sand from the lake bed.
Many people were also washing clothes and cattle in the puddles of water in the rear portion of the lake, team members added. Arappor Iyakkam plans to conduct more such audits on drinking water sources and compile a report. A similar audit was already conducted in Korattur lake. The report would soon be submitted to the departments concerned.
