Srinagar, Sept. 30 -- By K.P. Yadaw and Raja Muzaffar Bhat

Auditors going through the records of Jammu and Kashmir's lakes found that 315 of them, 45 per cent of the total and 1,537.07 hectares of water, have disappeared from official records.

Eighty belonged to the Forest and Wildlife Department and 235 to Revenue and Agriculture, so the loss lies in the files of two separate departments.

Across 518 lakes that have vanished or shrunk, the Comptroller and Auditor General named encroachment, siltation and untreated sewage, along with land-use change, deforestation and altered catchments.

Government conservation reached six lakes, Dal, Wular, Hokersar, Manasbal, Surinsar and Mansar, while the Forest Department identified no eligible wat...