Hyderabad: In violation of the Lokayukta’s directives to identify the full tank level (FTL) of the Burhankhan Cheruvu, the municipal staff of the Jalpally municipality under the previous BRS regime breached the embankment of the lake and drained out water to reduce its size to protect encroachers.In view of an unabated illegal encroachments with the patronage of local politicians in the Maheshwaram Assembly constituency, the size of the Burhanpur Cheruvu has shrunk from 78 acres to less than 15 acres.The floods of 2020 had inundated several illegal structures in nearby colonies, which were built in the lake bed. Following a petition, the High Court directed the Jalpally and Badangpet municipalities to remove illegal structures under the FTL and buffer zone and file an action taken report. No action was taken. The current spell of heavy rain inundated over 500 illegal structures in the lake bed.Apart from allocating funds to breach the embankment of the lake to reduce the water level, the local civic authorities laid cement-concrete roads in the lake bed to facilitate the residents of illegal structures.Adi Narayana, a resident of Weaker Sections Colony, said that a local people’s representative had put pressure on the authorities of the Jalpally municipality to release funds during the BRS rule to drain out the water from the lake using pipelines. The illegal construction of houses in colonies such as Green City, Ahmednagar, Allen Colony, Habeeb Colony, Shaheednagar, Shahi Hills and Shajahan Colony, has turned out to be curse for hundreds of poor people of the colony, said Adi Narayana, who lives downstream of the lake and was given a patta by the government.Unfazed by political consequences, Srinivas, a local Congress leader, blamed former minister Sabitha Indra Reddy for laying pipelines to drain out water from the Burhankhan Cheruvu.Mukarram, a resident of Osmannagar Colony which lies mostly in the lake bed, blamed the local pehelwans (strongmen) for their plight. “Some of us purchased the plots from the local heavyweights about 15 to 20 years ago, though many have illegally encroached the lake area,” said Mukarram.The Burhankhan Cheruvu was once located in a picturesque location with hills on all four sides. The lake was formed naturally with rain water reaching the lake. The encroachments started from the hillside and reached deep inside the lakebed. The current picture of hundreds of houses submerged in lake waters demonstrated how the lake has encroached, says Mukarram, who purchased the plot from a local pehelwan and lives on the edge of a hill.A local Congress leader from Balapur, C. Narasimha Reddy, whose family has been living in the area for many generations, said that the excess water from Wadde Kunta after reaching FTL limits, used to flow down to Burhankhan Cheruvu, and subsequently to Balapur Pedda Cheruvu and later Gurram Cheruvu before reaching the Musi river.All the lakes were interconnected with proper channels. The interconnectedness was broken due to illegal colonies that came up due to patronage by some local public representatives, he repents.According to an official survey conducted in 2014, the Burhankhan Cheruvu is a HMDA-identified lake and comes under Venkatapur village of Saroornagar mandal in Rangareddy district. The FTL limit of the lake is 78.231 acres with a bund length of 908 metres.Jalpally, located on the way to Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Shamshabad, which was once home to a large extent of government land and lakes. The area became the target of powerful land-grabbing mafia, which led to the shrinking of water bodies, including Jalpally Tank, Jalpally Kunta, Talla Kunta Cheruvu, Erra Kunta Cheruvu, and Burhankhan Cherru.The Jalpally Tank and Jalpally Kunta are connected water bodies, stretching over two kilometres and touch three different areas of Laxmiguda, Bandlaguda, and Errakunta.
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