From twenty-two acres, Veerathamman Temple Tank on Velachery Main Road has shrunk to two. Encroachments on all sides, except on the west, where the Velachery Main Road has acted as a deterrent to encroachers, has led to this situation. Residents of Pallaikaranai and neighbouring Jalladianpet have urged the Chennai Corporation to take action before any more encroachments eat into the water body, considered one of the oldest in the suburbs.
Sixty-nine-year old Navaneethammal of Pallikaranai (now under Chennai Corporation limits) recalls a time when she would fetch water from the tank which was punctuated with lilies and lotuses and surrounded by huge banyan and peepul trees. The flowers adorned the deities of the nearby temples. Lilies and lotuses still add a dash of colour to the tank, but are nowhere as abundant as before. That is because of the tank’s reduced size.
Until two decades ago, it sprawled over 22 acres, say residents. Residents and traders complain that the tank is littered with all sorts of plastic wastes and domestic refuse such as coconut shells. With these discards bobbing on the water, the tank is an eyesore. The people who take a morning stroll around the tank complain the most about this. After sustained pressure by resident welfare associations, a clean-up of the tank was undertaken in 2006. Over the next seven years, the tanks bunds were strengthened.
C. Rangan, councillor, ward 189, informs that the issue has been raised at many ward committee meetings and council meetings.
“I personally invited the officials and mayor to have a closer look at the tank and to undertake necessary action in this regard,” he says.
He says residents have asked him to ensure the tank is cleaned at the earliest and walkers’ path with barricades is laid around it. He points out that the Corporation had a plan to spend Rs 30 lakh onrenovation of the tank, drawing from the Mayor’s area development fund. He adds that in this plan, a pathway for pedestrians was included.
