PWD official says 5,000 waterbodies made encroachment-free The Madras High Court Bench here on Monday directed the Engineer-in-Chief (Water Resources Organisation), Public Works Department, to submit an action plan by February 24 on rejuvenating four to five major waterbodies in different regions of the State by desilting them, increasing their storage capacity through deepening and strengthening their bunds. A Division Bench comprising Justice R. Sudhakar and Justice V.M. Velumani passed the interim order in a public interest litigation petition filed by a lawyer, R. Lakshmanan. The petitioner had sought for a direction to the PWD to restore all waterbodies, including those that had been used by the government as well as private individuals to construct buildings over the years, to their original position. During the course of hearing of the case, the Engineer-in-Chief told the court that there over 13,000 waterbodies across the State. Of them, encroachments in over 5,000 water tanks had been removed completely by invoking the Tamil Nadu Protection of Tanks and Eviction of Encroachment Act 2007. Works to clear encroachments from the rest of the tanks were on. “We have also identified traditional (age old) waterbodies and restoring their storing capacity. So far, the works have been carried out in 720 water tanks. We are planning to deepen even below the fill of the tank so that the period for which these waterbodies could retain the water will be more,” he added and informed the court about various other ongoing projects. When Mr. Justice Sudhakar wanted to know why the PWD officials not use the services of people working under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) for deepening the major waterbodies in four different regions of the State, the Engineer-in-Chief said that it may not be possible because the work would require deployment of heavy machineries banned under the MGNREGS.