It's pouring woes

The heavy rains that lashed on Wednesday night, as expected, converted the city’s roads into rivulets, inundated homes in low lying areas and brought down a few trees. The control rooms of the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) were flooded with distress calls from citizens across the city. According to BBMP officials, a few homes in Vaddarapalya, 2 Block H.R.B.R. Layout, 2 Cross Lingarajapuram and Kaggadasapura were inundated by the flood waters. The basement of an apartment in Maruthinagar in Malleshpalya was completely flooded. The BBMP officials said that the water had to be drained out using a motor. The retaining wall of a drain in Babusapalya, near Hennur police station, came down following the heavy rain. This caused the water to overflow from the drain, flood the road and inundate a few homes nearby, said Anand, a local resident. “We had to remove the water from the houses in the night. After several hours, the flood waters finally receded,” he said. The control rooms also received many complaints about tree falls from across the city. Complaints were registered from NTI Layout in Sanjayanagar, Kalyan Nagar, 2 Stage MICO Layout, Yeshwantpur, Ishwar Layout, Hennur Cross, K.G. Halli Main Road, H.R.B.R. Layout and Lingarajapuram. The condition of B.V.K. Iyengar Road and A.S. Char Street in the heart of the city has deteriorated further after the heavy rains. The roads that witness huge volume of vehicular movement are full of deep craters that get filled with the rainwater. Vimal Raj Mehta, a local trader, said that most roads in Mamulpet area are in a poor state. “Despite several complaints, no remedial action has been taken up by the authorities concerned, especially the BBMP,” he charged. Meanwhile, Mayor B.S. Sathyanarayana told The Hindu other than a few stray incidents, there was no major rain damage that was reported in the city. “I was monitoring the situation and in touch with the control rooms in all eight zones till midnight. We are prepared with the men and material in all control rooms to tackle emergency situations following heavy rains,” he said.