The High Court of Karnataka on Wednesday said that the State government and its instrumentalities should first take steps to remove their encroachments on lakes and the surrounding buffer zones to set an example for others.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice M. Nagaprasanna made the observing in its order while hearing PIL petitions related to protection and maintenance of lakes and stormwater drains.
Noticing that certain development activities were carried out by the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike and other instrumentalities of the State, the Bench said that it is the obligation of the State and its agencies to protect the lake and buffer zones around lakes. If encroachments put up by State and its instrumentalities are removed, then the other encroachers can follow suit, the bench observed.
Meanwhile, the bench directed the BBMP to give its response on implementing recommendations made by the CSIR-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI) for surveying Arehalli, Kamakshipalya and Tavarekere lakes and providing boundaries through GPS documentations.
Also, the bench asked the BBMP’s Executive Engineer (Lake Development) to explain how the tender for preparing DPR for development of certain lakes were issued even before the NEERI submitted its restoration plans.
The bench granted more time for the State government to carry out a survey of all lakes in Karnataka and the buffer zones around all the lakes as per an earlier order while pointing out that the government had not completed survey of even half of the lakes in the city and, moreover, buffer zones were not surveyed.
