Ubeer Naqushbandi
SRINAGAR
The encroachments on ‘once pristine’ water bodies ‘Mokhti Pokhar’ and ‘Vicharnag’ at Nowshera in the outskirts of Srinagar city have caught Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) napping.
The ‘illegal’ structures and plantation of poplars have proven to be the final nail in the coffin for already ‘dead’ water body, said an elderly Ghulam A Ganaie.
The development has surfaced despite the experts after the devastating 2014 deluge raising ‘alarm bells’ over the encroachments of water bodies.
When contacted, SMC’s enforcement officer Nissar Ahmad said he was unaware of this development, saying, “the matter has been brought into notice, action will be initiated”.
The water bodies forming an extension of ‘Anchar’ lake make an important part of ‘hydrological system’ of it and any fiddling with them would result into an ecological disaster, said a scholar of Geoinformatics at Kashmir University.
