These include installing about 900 mini-sewage treatment units on houseboats."When we talk about overall tourist inflow and the number of the visitors who choose to stay in houseboats, this has been another worse season," said Muhammad Azim Tuman, a former chairman of the Houseboat Owners Association.Houseboat owners also complain of harassment at the hands of the authorities. The Lawda had, sometime ago, even threatened to cancel the licenses of the houseboats in the belief that these are the main source of pollution of the Dal and Nageen.The houseboat, Kashmir’s unique floating home, in its incarnation today is an innovation of the British.  In the heart of the scenic Vale of Kashmir is Srinagar, the summer capital spread-eagled around the vast expanse of the blue waters of the river Jhelum.J&K’s chief secretary B. They fear that these icons of Kashmir’s once thriving tourism industry may soon exist only on postcards.Mr Tuman said that official studies carried out in the past have found that houseboats are responsible only for three per cent of pollution in the Dal lake.The ongoing debate on Constitutions Article 35A, which gives special rights to state subjects, has brought back focus on house boats and the 1927 order which played a role in their creation by the Kashmir-loving British.However, these claims were contested by the houseboat owners. Connected with this are the Dal and the Nageen lakes, the kaleidoscope of colour with their beautiful houseboats, their shikaras (water gondolas) with their gay canopies, and of course, the idyllic gardens and natural surroundings. (Photo: H.As the new law prohibited land ownership in the state also by the foreigners, the Britishers took to living on water.R. In 1927, Maharaja Hari Singh, the last Dogra ruler of the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir under the British paramountcy enacted the hereditary state subject order which granted to the state subjects the right to government office and the right to land use and ownership and debarring the non-state subjects from acquiring immovable properties and government jobs.  

The lake and waterways development authority (Lawda), the department of tourism and the Srinagar Municipal Corporation together have made the repair and re-construction of the houseboats difficult because of long running pollution concerns. structural rivets Suppliers More than a decade ago, the Lawda had ordered all houseboat owners to stop operation or face forced closings after the J&K high court barred people from operating houseboats and hotels on the lake.    A house boat in Srinagar.The Lawda has also moved a proposal for increasing the capacity of sewage treatment plants (STP) around the Dal from the existing 36 mld to 50 mld "to ensure that no raw sewage from the catchments goes into the lake".V.Sewage from boats considered major source of pollution in water bodies. We’re also strengthening the drainage and STP network to prevent night soil of around 60,000 population presently going directly into the lake."The process of installation of holding tanks and bio-digesters for 900 houseboats at a cumulative cost of Rs 15 crores will be completed by November 30," a spokesman of the Lawda said