Panic in Powai after crocodile kills a 32-year old man

http://www.mumbaimirror.com/article/2/201008272010082704232841215f6cb1b/Panic-in-Powai-after-croc-attack.html

I spent some wonderful moments in the IIT campus in the late-1990s and an old friend of mine told me on many occasions that the lake has crocodiles. I had no reason to not believe her but today's news is shocking. From being a peaceful, quite and romantic place, the Powai lake has been destroyed. There was a time when I would enjoy the sunset and twilight from outside the IIT guesthouse. There was a lurking fear of snakes, leopards or the mad cow but never once did I fear getting attacked by a croc.

The real problem is that the area around the once-idyllic lake is now a concrete jungle. The lake is covered by water-hyacinths thanks to the untreated sewage that gets dumped there everyday. There's a 5-star hotel, a promenade and a jogger's track. This basically leaves out the IIT campus as the only place that a croc can rest on and take in some sun. So yes, the area in front of the guest house is really dangerous. But I am sure that this man was fishing in the lake.

The Sanjay Gandhi National Park and the green belt around the Aarey Colony need to be protected from greedy builders and politicians, lest we see more deaths that take place as nature claims back what is rightly hers.