As a boy, A. R. Basheer Ahmed thought Ukkadam Periyakulam was an ocean. Years later, he joined the effort to restore it. By then, sewage, rubbish and spreading water hyacinth had taken their toll on the lake he remembered.
Basheer’s recollection appears in reporting by Pankaja Srinivasan and Subha J Rao, republished by Vikalp Sangam in 2014. Alongside him were people with very different reasons to care. For fisherman B. Ganesh, the lake had provided a living for 18 years; declining conditions were making that livelihood harder to sustain.
Sundays on the lake bed
The cleanup brought schoolchildren, workers, families and older residents onto the exposed lake bed. Volunteers passed containers of earth along human chains while excavators handled the heavier work. Siruthuli, RAAC, the city corporation and Vijayalakshmi Charitable Trust were involved in the effort.
Basheer wanted a walking track around the water again. Others hoped for better fishing or a chance to go boating. Restoring Periyakulam meant recovering something they had used and loved, not simply improving a view.
A waterfront made from the city’s leftovers
Years later, a different kind of work drew on Coimbatore’s ingenuity. In April 2023, sculptors Yesvendiran, Sarath Kumar and Ramkumar Kannadasan were creating pieces for the lakefront from discarded materials. Their supplies included streetlight poles, broken furniture and parts from abandoned vehicles. A car, a hand pump and a gramophone were among the forms taking shape. The New Indian Express reported on the artists’ work.
The car and pump were especially fitting choices for a city known for manufacturing both. The artists were giving the waterfront something recognisably Coimbatore: familiar objects, made again from things the city had thrown away.
What the promenade cannot replace
Underneath these changes, Periyakulam remains part of a connected water system. Its downstream links run towards Valankulam and Singanallur, then the Noyyal. Keeping it healthy involves more than caring for the paths along its edge. Coimbatore Smart City maps those connections.
For an evening beside the lake, use our Ukkadam Periyakulam visitor guide. And remember Basheer’s wish: somewhere to walk beside the water he had known as a child. Behind the redevelopment projects was that simple, personal hope—to have his lake back.