A Case of Upper Lake in the City of Bhopal, India
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GSTF Journal of Engineering Technology (JET) Vol.5 No.1, 2018 Conserving Catchment Area of Lakes through Development Regulations: A Case of Upper Lake in the City of Bhopal, India Ar. Keerti Manisha Dr. Rama U Pandey Planning Department, Planning Department, School of Planning and Architecture School of Planning and Architecture Neelbad Road, Bhauri, Bhopal - 462030 Neelbad Road, Bhauri, Bhopal - 462030 [email protected] [email protected] Abstract- A lake provides a wide range of ecological services regulating, supporting and cultural [23]. Lakes also support useful for the sustenance and betterment of human lives and significant recreational and social activities transferable into other living organisms. A lake is a reflection of its catchment, if economic benefits through tourism. Both the lake and its the catchment area is healthy, then the ecological services catchment area have been inextricably linked in terms of their provided are better. The fast-paced development activities in the ecosystem services and the complex nature of their catchment area of lakes and the over-consumption of available interactions. Lakes have witnessed large scale degradation of resources are resulting in the degradation of lake’s ecological their environment in general and water quality in particular services. The Upper Lake in Bhopal, a million plus population [28]. Major threats to the lakes are; discharge of sewage water, city situated in the central part of India has been selected for the the growth of thick mats of aquatic weeds and increased study. The current regulatory regime for environmental conservation of the catchment area comprises of a legislative siltation from its catchment area. To protect lakes, there is a framework and a set of regulatory institutions. Inadequacies in need to regulate anthropogenic activities happening in the each result not only in accelerated environmental degradation catchment area. Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate but also delays and escalates the costs of development projects. Change of India considers the importance of regulatory Development control regulations for the catchment area of urban measures for the lake and its catchment area [13]. National water bodies require a holistic approach. This paper is an Environment Policy 2006 of India also recognizes the attempt to find out the gaps in the existing institutional ecological services provided by wetlands and emphasizes the framework to conserve the catchment area. The focus is to need to set up a regulatory mechanism [18]. identify and assess the major issues pertaining to the degradation of the Upper Lake and its catchment area and formulation of Bhopal is a million plus population city located in the development regulations for its conservation. For the purpose of central part of India also known as the city of lakes. The Upper this study, the catchment area of Upper Lake has been delineated Lake is the largest of all the lakes in the city. For the purpose with the help of catchment area assessment technique. The of the study, the Upper Lake and its catchment area is existing development regulations and policies prevailing in the selected. It is a part of Bhoj wetland, recognized as one of the selected area has been reviewed for identifying the gaps wetlands under Ramsar convention in the year 2002 for its responsible for environmental degradation of the catchment rich biodiversity. Upper Lake’s catchment area spreads area. Geographic information system is used extensively for between two districts, namely Sehore and Bhopal. Both the analyzing environmental status of the region in parallel with a districts have various levels of authorities with roles further primary survey targeting the village stakeholders in catchment limited to their respective action areas leading to the area to analyze socio-economic profile and to assess the uncontrolled growth of anthropogenic activities in the agricultural practices adopted. As an outcome, an institutional catchment area. The ecological and hydrological processes of framework is formulated to conserve, govern and monitor the the Upper Lake are adversely affected due to unprecedented catchment area and the Upper Lake. population growth, consequent urbanization, land use change, industrialization and chemical-intensive agriculture [16]. The Keywords- Catchment, Development Regulations, Ecosystem aim of this paper is to propose an institutional framework Services, Urban Water Body, Wetland along with a regulatory body that shall consider both the Upper Lake and its catchment area as a single entity. I. INTRODUCTION Lakes have been categorized in several ways, based on the II. IMPORTANCE OF CATCHMENT AREA mode of their origin; they are either natural or constructed. In The catchment of the lakes may vary considerably with the semi-arid and arid regions of western peninsular India, respect to their area, biophysical characters and land use. waterbodies have been constructed, e.g., Lake Sudarshan in Catchments of urban and suburban lakes has been mainly Gujarat, Upper Lake in Bhopal, etc. They are the most dominated by human settlements contributing to both accessible and precious source of fresh water for human use. wastewater and solid waste generation. It could be related to a Lakes have an exceptional biological diversity and provide a funnel, which collects water that drains into an area and wide range of ecosystem services such as provisioning, channels it into streams, rivers or oceans. They include rural DOI: 10.5176/ 2251-3701_5.1.115 © The Author(s) 2018. This article is published with open access by the GSTF GSTF Journal of Engineering Technology (JET) Vol.5 No.1, 2018 areas such as agricultural land, forests, grasslands, urban areas Organization (NGO) are neglected most often by the such as city centers and housing. The land within a catchment authorities to create awareness amongst the people. affects both the quality and quantity of water available to human beings and wildlife. Lakes in current Indian scenario face the similar set of issues, predominantly siltation, shrinking at the periphery due Catchments are important because all the living organisms to encroachment and pollution. To protect, conserve and rely on water and other natural resources to exist. All the restore the lakes, provisions like self-sustainability plans; activities taking place in the catchment area affects the conservation and management plans for the lakes has been ecological conditions and the ecosystem services provided by adopted. For example, Powai Lake is an artificial lake in the lakes [26]. “A lake is a reflection of its catchment,” Mumbai, with the physiographic area of 2.1 Km2. The issues meaning with a well-protected catchment area, the water associated with the lake is siltation and eutrophication. The quality of the lake is of potable standards [27]. Lobau is a authority has taken up restoration work in the area. The Powai Vienna floodplain in Austria that retains flood water, Senior Citizens’ Association (PSCA) has come up with a self- recharges the ground water and provides drinking water and sustainability (ecotourism) plan for the lake [10]. Dal Lake recreation over 600,000 visitors a year. It was designated as a situated in Srinagar valley, Jammu and Kashmir had the Ramsar wetland for its rich biodiversity under the European physiographic area of 75 Km2, which in 2016 barely stretches Unions’s Natura 2000 network [3]. to 12 Km2. Conservation and management of Dal Lake has been proposed for restoration. Any construction within the Dal III. ISSUES IN THE CATCHMENT AREA OF AN Lake, 200 m from the lake has been restricted by the authority URBAN WATER BODY [15]. Loktak Lake is a freshwater lake (only floating lake in the world) located in Manipur with a physiographic area of 75 For the health of a city, lakes act as the biological 2 barometers. The condition of any lake and its ecosystem Km . The Loktak Development Authority (LDA) & Wetlands depends upon the nature of the wetland and its exposure to International Asia (WISA) have taken up Short-Term Action various environmental factors [2]. The degradation of a lake Plan (STAP) for its conservation and management [29]. and its catchment is mainly due to deforestation, stone Similar initiatives are also proposed for Hussain Sagar Lake in quarrying, sand mining, agricultural practices, soil erosion and Telangana [8]. increased siltation [24]. The greed based development tends to overlook the existing environmental conditions of the region. IV. METHODOLOGY Water bodies and drainage network are most vulnerable to The study has been carried out in three stages. The first such unprecedented development. The cause of such stage is to understand the existing development regulations unplanned and unprecedented growth is poor planning applicable to the catchment area. Existing policies and approach and insensitive governance. The intensive organizational setup are studied to identify and highlight the agricultural practices and land use change due to residential gaps in the current framework. The second stage is to find out development in the catchment reduces the inflow of water into the issues responsible for environmental degradation in the the reservoirs. catchment area. The catchment area of the Upper Lake has been delineated with the help of catchment area assessment The policy and decision makers design policies solitary technique using GIS and remote sensing. Topo sheet was catering to public benefits, resulting into injustice towards the referred to while outlining catchment area using Theissen environment. Therefore, efforts taken for protecting the urban Polygon Model (TPM). Thereon, slope analysis has been lakes have not been helpful in meeting the objective of carried forth using Digital Elevation Model (DEM) imagery conserving their ecosystem. The catchment area of the procured from USGS- Earth Explorer website. The Pallikaranai marshland, Chennai was of 50 Km2, it has 2 hydrological tool has been used to analyze the stream orders in reduced to 4.3 Km [19] that resulted in a devastating flooding the existing perennial source of water. Morphometric analysis in the city in 2015.