LUCKNOW, July 27 -- The future of the Gomti may lie not in the river itself but in nearly 10,000 ponds, lakes, wetlands and village water bodies spread across its basin. Once the lifeline of the river, many of these water bodies today stand encroached upon, silted or neglected. Environmental experts say restoring this forgotten network is the key to reviving one of Uttar Pradesh's most important rivers.

These traditional water bodies, located within a two-kilometre ecological radius of the Gomti and its tributaries, once functioned as a finely balanced hydrological system. They stored monsoon rain, recharged groundwater, reduced floods and sustained the river's base flow during dry months. Today, encroachment, silt accumulation and negle...