AHMEDABAD: Even as Gujarat cities and towns are slow to act on preserving water bodies, the Union water resources department shot a serious missive recently and sought the status of water bodies in Gujarat.Union water resource and river development secretary Shashi Shekhar had earlier written to state government seeking action taken with respect to encroachment, silting, drying up, and existing urbanisation pressures on lakes and water bodies in urban and rural limits. "The importance of water bodies has been re-established during drought situations and water-scarce conditions in various parts of the country," Shekhar had written, while reminding that an earlier letter written on February 26, 2016 was not answered too.In 2005, the state government had notified 44,138 lakes, almost two and half times the number of lakes that are claimed to be desilted under the Sujalam Sufalam Jal Sanchay Abhiyan. Almost 1,939 are within urban areas. Of them, 625 are within the urban limits of Vadodara, the highest in the state. In Vadodara's Bapod area alone, 38 lakes are completely silted, 26 have turned into dry pits, 11 lakes disappeared to build roads, three lakes have been reserved for police housing, district panchayat housing and Sardar industrial estate. Surat urban limits have 330 lakes while Ahmedabad has 61 and Rajkot nine notified lakes.But sadly, most of these face the danger of disappearing with agencies hardly moved to save them over the past 13 years."Narmada and Tapi, two biggest sources of water are regulated by MP and Maharashtra. Had we managed our lakes and ponds, we would have revived the Saurashtra, Kutch streams as these ground aquifers feed the base flow of these rivers. But here we refuse to acknowledge our traditional water sources," environmental activist Mahesh Pandya had told TOI earlier.

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