The Madras High court has refused to order the opening of the sluices of a 126-acre lake in Namakkal district, to protect residential houses that have been constructed illegally on plots of land prone to submerging when the water level in the lake remains high. It has said, the precious water required for the ayacutdars (farmers entitled to irrigation rights from a water body) until the next monsoon could not be wasted now for the benefit of the lawbreakers.

“It is only the man made mischief which has to be undone and not the natural stagnation of water which has to be prevented,” wrote Acting Chief Justice T. Raja and Justice D. Bharatha Chakravarthy while dismissing the case filed by the Chandrasekarapuram panchayat president who had sought a direction to open the sluices of the sprawling lake situated in the adjacent Anaipalayam village at Rasipuram Taluk in Nammakal