24 February 2004	Tuesday	03 Muharram 1425

ISLAMABAD, Feb 23: Pakistan Environment Protection Agency (Pepa) will continuously monitor the population level of Rawal Lake, an official source told Dawn. According to the recently-held meeting of Rawal Lake Catchment Management Committee (RLCMC), the biological oxygen demand of the lake had jumped up to an alarming level of 680 miligram per litre (mg/l) against the National Environmental Quality Standard's (NEQS) approved level of 80 mg/l.

The presence of high levels of different pollutants in the lake has prompted Pepa to start continuous monitoring of the lake, he said "This is something very serious and if not controlled immediately, it will have far reaching health impacts on the end users," he said.

Rawal Lake is the main source of water supply to Rawalpindi city and cantonment. Rawal dam is constructed on Korang river and has a catchment area of 106 sq miles which generates 84,000 acre feet of water in an average rainfall year.

Interestingly, he said in 1995 the Pakistan Environment Protection Council appointed a task force for the control of pollution in Rawal Lake, and in turn the task force set up a committee.

Organizations that represented the task force were Capital Development Authority (CDA), Rawalpindi Municipal Corporation (RMC), Rawalpindi Cantonment Board (RCB), Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA) and representatives from the local secretariat.

Similarly, in the same year a workshop was convened on coordination of Rawalpindi-Islamabad administration to control pollution level of the lake, but to this date, all these efforts remained restricted to the meetings, conferences and briefings, he said.

In response to a question, the source said had this issue been somewhere in Europe, affected population would have wreaked havoc on responsible government organizations. But unfortunately here people are least bothered even to know the fact that water they are consuming will have dangerous implications on their lives.

Initially, Pepa will take water samples from the lake on regular intervals and will establish its own data to know what sorts of pollutants were affecting the lake, the source said. "Yes, the agency can get hold of responsible organizations for not taking adequate measures for the protection of Rawal Lake", he added.