Water bodies in Dimapur- The great need to save them

Dimapur district which is the nerve centre and the commercial capital of the state was recently trifurcated all on a sudden or rather very hastily without much groundwork or proper planning and demarcation of the district boundaries and there appears to be more confusion without proper administrative jurisdiction being defined e,g, the Commisioner of Police Dimapur controls all the three districts of Dimapur, Niuland and Chumukedima. Whereas there are three Deputy Commissioners in the districts and there is confusion prevailing in most of the departments- can we call it good governance ? The roads are mostly in a state of non-maintenance, power situation can hardly called stable, water supply is mostly through boring/tube wells made by the inhabitants themselves not water supply pipelines of the Government and many depend on the lakes constructed by the Dimasa/Ahom kings in Dimapur, which are not being maintained. The four lane highway through the three districts is perhaps the only real development happening but unfortunately many patches are far from satisfactory- in fact the road from Dimapur to Kohima was closed for several weeks causing so much hardship to the public during this year. This is an appeal to the Government of the day to wake up. While it is not possible to expect a utopian situation on all fronts- it is expected that the Government which is for the people must address at least some of the vital issues immediately. Let us not forget that we have got statehood 61 years ago ahead of most of our neighboring states in the region and look at where we are today. If festival is called development, perhaps Hornbill festival is the only feather in our cap ? let me make a specific comment on the water bodies in east Dimapur with particular reference to Jorapukhri lake. The Jorapukhri council, Purana bazaar, Dimapur had submitted a proposal to the Urban development, Government of Nagaland for taking up with the Urban development Ministry Government of India and fortunately it was approved under Amrut-II and funds have been sanctioned before September 2024 but till date nothing seems to be happening. While the council or the citizens are not interested in who is to going to execute the work, but there is a very serious concern about this lake as it provides drinking water to many marginal inhabitants in the locality and the fear of encroachments by unscrupulous elements as the lake is fully covered by weed and the water is hardly visible. When funds have been received, why this delay ? The colony citizens are extremely anxious about this work and will not take it lying down if for any reason it is not executed in time satisfactorily.
H.K. Khulu, IAS
(Retd) Additional Chief Secretary, Advisor Jorapukhri Council, Purana bazaar, Dimapur