Government sleeps over hard lessons of July 2016 deluge

BENGALURU: Independence Day brought no holiday cheer to Bengalureans this year. Several of them started their day as early as 4 am, emptying water from their houses. Homes were flooded, roads submerged and people marooned on Tuesday morning after heavy rains overnight. The city surely has not learnt lessons from the July 2016 deluge.

When the floods wreaked havoc last year, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike razed houses built on rajakaluves (storm water drains). The chief minister himself had ordered the demolition drive and it was shown as the solution. The government had also set aside Rs 200 crore to remodel storm water drains (SWD). Clearly , none of that worked.

BBMP's chief engineer (storm water drains) Sidde Gowda maintained that there was no flooding in places such as Avani Sringerinagar, Chennammana Kere near Kathriguppe, Bommanahalli and Gali Anjaneya temple on Mysuru Road and Manyata Tech Park, where the SWD work has been completed. Similar projects had not taken place in the localities affected by the overnight rains, he said.

"We could complete only 30% of the drain-related work. The Rs 200 crore was marked only to strengthen 182 km of SWDs. Of this, we have completed work related to the construction of retaining walls and desilting for a stretch of 38 km and work on the remaining 142-km stretch is under progress," he said.He added that Bengaluru has 842 km of drain network.

IT'S NO DIFFERENT THIS TIME
Since early morning, SN Tekur and his family was busy pumping water out and taking their belongings to a safer place upstairs. The retired HAL employee lives in Koramangala Fourth Block, one of most affected parts of the city .

"Though the locality used to flood since 2008, it is for the first time water is entering our kitchen and bedroom, damaging the refrigerator and furniture. There is no place for rainwater to drain, what with the number of buildings," he said.

As the primary drains started overflowing, many roads and hundreds of houses in and around Koramangala, Ejipura, HSR Layout, BTM Layout, Bellandur, Madiwala, Adugodi, Silk Board, JP Nagar, K R Puram, Ulsoor and Anugraha Layout were submerged, keeping people indoors. Traffic too was disrupted on many arterial and sub-arterial roads including the Outer Ring Road and Old Airport Road.

Although residents could scoop out the water, the silt remained. Water entered the basements of most buildings, submerging vehicles parked there.

Nagendra Kini and his wife Ankita Prabhu had planned to go on a long drive to Mysuru. But they woke up to a rude shock this morning. Their twomonth-old car, parked in the basement of their apartment in Dollar's Colony , was submerged in rainwater.They had to wait hours for the 10-ft water to subside.

Vasanthi Vinod, a resident of ST Bed Layout, said her family was confined indoors for half of the day as the approach road to her house was inundated with knee-deep water. "We called up the BBMP Control Room but nobody turned up," she said.

It was the same case with Jayashree Sudhir, a private firm employee, living in Madiwala. "We were indoors till 1 pm until the blockage was cleared," she said.

I-DAY CELEBRATION HIT
Tuesday's record rainfall affected the Independence Day parade too. The turnout was less at the Field Marshal Manekshaw Parade Grounds. The grounds had pools of water and the BBMP had to lay layers of dry sand before the event could take place. The temporary pandals erected for VIPs and guests were soaked in rainwater, which dripped throughout the event.

The BWSSB received as many as 203 complaints related only to overflowing sanitary lines, mostly in places such as Koramangala, JP Nagar and Jayanagar.

The Bengaluru Metropolitan Transport Corporation withdrew 156 of the 300 bus services it operates from the Shantinagar depot.