ASSESSMENT, ANALYSIS AND STUDY OF ENCROACHMENTS AND CHANGE IN NATURAL WATER FLOW IN INTERIORS OF WORLD FAMOUS DAL LAKE DURING 2003 -2015.

Abstract

Advancements in study and assessment of changing land use patterns using modern techniques like use of satellite data is inevitable today owing to high accuracy and ease of its accessibility to researchers. In this study, satellite images of over last ten years have been precisely used to analyze the changes in natural water flow and geographic characteristics of world famous Dal Lake in state of Jammu & Kashmir arising due uncontrolled human expansion and destruction of natural lake topography. The lake currently in advanced stages of eutrophication has been rapidly shrinking in its area at an alarming rate over last five decades. Major contributors to such changes are the direct or indirect discharge of untreated wastes from Srinagar city into water body through numerous sewer lines and uncontrolled land filling by local inhabitants in interiors of lake to meet their growing needs of urbanization and need for more agricultural land. Nutrients such as phosphorus and nitrogen derived from growth of vegetation within the lake and sewage have drastically altered water quality parameters and dramatically disrupted the Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD) of lake from years; making the water obtained from lake unfit for any kind of consumption or aquatic life. Uncontrolled pollution and wide encroachments laden with exponential increase of sewage discharges have led to severe changes in land use pattern in interiors of the lake which is the main source of destruction of natural physiognomies of lake and gradual choking up of its water sources. All this has compounded into complete breakdown of drainage mechanism of the Lake with a threat of floods in Lake Catchment unavoidable in coming time.