Lotus Pond of Pallikkaranai (Waterbodies of Chennai - 30)

Those who travel on Velachery Main Road between Velachery and Pallikkaranai cannot miss this large lotus pond. It has full of water with lotus flowers floating on it. Surrounded by various trees and a pathway, it also serves as a park.

People refer to this pond as Lotus Pond nowadays. Few people even refer to this as the Adi Pureeswarar temple tank, as they believe this waterbody belongs to that temple on the other side of the road. However, it is not correct. The pond is named Veerathaman Temple Pond. The temple that owns this pond is tiny and hidden amidst the concrete jungle.

The pond, with a typical rural look, is well maintained today. There is no doubt. But that was not the case till a few years ago. You are not wrong if you think this is such a huge pond that spreads across two acres. It is difficult to find a pond of this size in Chennai. Well, what we see is merely 10% of the remaining pond. Originally the pond covered an area of about 22 acres.

Happy travelling.

Note: As per a report, there were about 650+ waterbodies in the Chennai region till the 1980s. Today, only a fraction of them exist. And most of those surviving waterbodies hardly have water, and even some of them that have water have been poorly shrunk. In Chennai, there are tank roads without tanks nearby and lake-view roads without lakes. There is a high possibility that even the few waterbodies we have today might vanish soon. I decided to visit the currently surviving waterbodies of Chennai and its suburbs and write about them in my blog as a series.

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