That Bangalore is known as the Garden City is common knowledge. But, did you know that it was also once called the City of Lakes? However, this tag was lost over time as the water bodies started getting polluted. Perhaps the Lake Policy 2011 might help the city regain its former glory-and the tag, too.

“There are over 6,000 lakes in the state. Bangalore alone has 4,000 water bodies and over 60% of them have either vanished or transformed into cesspools of city's domestic effluents,” said state minister for environment and ecology J Krishna Palemar.

"The mapping of all 4,000 water bodies has been taken up. Soon, we will get to know how many we have lost and how many of them can be revived," he said.

On the sidelines of a function in Mangalore to start up a state-level lake revival programme on Saturday, Palemar said that culprits who dump sewage into the lakes will be punished.

He said that the Lake Policy 2011 will give powers to civic bodies such as the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) and the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) to take action against offenders. The policy will also make it mandatory for the builders of large housing projects to have in-house sewage treatment plants and recycle water.

Palemar said that the pollution control board will also help in the revival of lakes through its studies and evaluations.

Former chairman of the State Environmental Impact Assessment Authority, Prof Srinikethan of National Institute of Technology Karnataka at Surathkal told DNA that a report has been submitted on the importance of captive and mini sewage management plants in multistorey buildings in the city.