The changing face of life gets reflected in the waters of this lake,

changing times –the ebb and flow of life eternal.In the past green was more intense, the sky used to be an azure blue, habitation was less, and water was more.There were plenty of fishes which provided a livelihood for all that was Rudrasagar.It was here that Maharaja Bir Bikram Kishore Manikya Bahadur, the erstwhile king of Tripura, constructed a beautiful lake place in the year 1930. Poet Rabindranath Tagore christened it Neermahal.The only lake palace of its kind in North East India, Neermahal is a major tourist attraction of Tripura.

Then came change accompanied by clouds of sadness. The atmosphere started getting polluted. The green started fading fast, the lake shrank, water dwindled and so did aquatic life, fauna and flora.Once on the shores of the lake there was a dense forest cover infested by wild animals and birds.Today there are human habitats all around. Wild animals have disappeared, birds do not come.The lake is shrinking due to sedimentation through River Gumti during monsoons. It has shrunk by 42 percent since 1955. Today the lake is turning into a paddy field.The setting up of a brick kiln has been the last nail in the coffin.Today the condition of the palace is dilapidated in spite of sincere efforts to maintain it.

With pollution levels rising and threatening the ecological balance of the region, the families of around two thousand fishermen around the lake are facing a threat as the lake is dying.

Dhirendra Barman an old fisherman said, “In the past there was good number of fish in the lake but gradually with increase of the population the pressure on the lake increased and moreover, due to shrinking and pollution of the lake now the fisherman’s community is under threat. Now we do not get enough fish to run our family smoothly, many were compelled to choose other trades and only a few are left who are now still fishing. There are no more big fishes like in the past when every day several vehicles were loaded with fishes from this lake that went to cities to be sold. Now we are facing problems, as are the boatmen who depend on the tourists as tourists are no longer visiting because the lake is not attractive any more. The lake has shrunk to such a level that there was a proposal to make a linkage road with the Neermahal palace.”

Ashes Gupta who has been witnessing the diminishing condition of the lake and its surrounding during the past ten years is of the same opinion.Gupta recalls, “In the past the lake was big and had plenty of fishes on which the fishermen’s community survived. Moreover, plenty of tourists used to visit the area to see the lake and the palace but today the number of tourists has been drastically reduced as has the water in the lake which is barely knee deep at many places.”

The Government has been planning to increase the depth of the lake. Seeing the condition of the lake, the government has taken few steps along with Brahmaputra Board and Wasteland Development Corporation and proposed to use bulldozers to increase the depth of the lake. This will cost around 16 crores but nothing much has been done to save this dying lake.

Subal Rudra a local leader fears that if steps are not taken right now, a day will come when the lake will turned into a paddy field.