Stating that encroachment of lakes in urban areas is ridden with various issues with medical and other private institutions coming up on the lakes, irrigation minister T Harish Rao has said an action plan will be formulated to resolve such issues by focusing on one lake at a time.

Discussions with opposition parties and various organisations will also be held on the issue.

“Decisions need to be taken about the kind of action that can be taken against those who encroach and on how to prevent further encroachments,” Rao said at a seminar on ‘Mission Kakatiya: Restoration of Lakes in Telangana’, organised by Council for Green Revolution (CGR) here on Sunday on the occasion of World Water Day.

Speaking about encroachment of lakes, he said 10 pc of over 46,000 lakes in the state are either encroached in urban areas or polluted in industrial belts. As part of Mission Kakatiya, priority will be given to lakes which get filled with a few rains.

Welcoming the government’s programme to restore lakes in the state, environmentalist K Purushotham Reddy said governments cannot wash away their hands if there was scarcity of rainfall and they should adopt cloud-seeding to overcome the problem.

“China has a regiment of 550 planes and 1,500 anti-aircraft guns are filled with cloud-seeding material. Whenever they spot a low-lying cloud, they seed it,” Reddy said. Deputy speaker M Padma Devender Reddy, CGR president K Leela Laxma Reddy, and CPI and CPM leaders were present.