Heavy rains wash away claims of monsoon preparedness by Govt

Every monsoon, the capital turns into Venice. While the civic agencies and the Delhi government's public works department (PWD) play the blame-game, commuters suffer. Waterlogged arterial roads, bring the city to its knees.

It has been years and claims of monsoon preparedness made by several governments have been washed away each time when the monsoons arrive.

According to urban planners and road experts, poor road design, failure of maintenance of roads, lack of proper de-silting of drains are the major factors behind the issue.

However, the carelessness of multiplicity authority and poor coordination between the agencies have led to such a situation year after year.

While 60 feet and above roads and the big drains come under the jurisdiction of the PWD, 30-feet wide roads and residential drains fall under the municipal corporations.

Despite, Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal's instructions to clear silt from the city's drains, the efforts by the civic authorities have not brought results.

Earlier this week, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had said that the city needed a separate body for the cleaning of drains and maintenance of roads.

...& ANALYSIS

• The waterlogging issue is a perennial problem however, the city government has failed to address it time and again.
   
• The government must set up one nodal body to clean drains and maintain roads as well as to monitor the waterlogging situation.
   
• The drains need to be de-silted throughout the year and not just a few months before the monsoon in order to resolve the problem.

QUOTES

"The de-silting work begins only a few months before the monsoon, which does not get completed in time and the rains start. It becomes a hassle to get the vehicles out and long traffic snarls on all the routes. At times, one has to wade through knee deep water."
—JR Gupta, Safdarjung enclave

"The sewage water gets accumulated on the streets even during light rainfall. The MCD puts the de-silted waste around the drains only. The roads are full of muck during the monsoon."
—Shakuntala Devi, Lakshmi Nagar

"Waterlogging in our area has resulted into many injuries, since the waste on streets is not cleared by MCD on time. Some elderly people have slipped while children have also got hurt."
—Girish Rohtagi, IP Extension

"During the monsoon, it becomes a pain commuting to my office at South Extension. Roads are jammed with the traffic crawling. On Saturday, it took me almost three hours to reach home ami heavy rainfall."              
—Vinod Bhat, Gurgaon

EXPERT SPEAK

Poor road design and lack of adequate de-silting are the major factors. The gradient is not aligned with the drains not allowing the water to discharge. Second, even the arterial roads have potholes, as regular maintenance is not done. Besides, the de-silted waste is again left into the drains choking them. The government must consider setting up a single body for this."
—PK Sarkar, Head, Transport Planning, School of Planning and Architecture

One of the major reasons is that the road construction is not done in a way keeping in mind the slopes and ramps, which should be connected to drains at frequent intervals. This is why the water is not drained out leading to waterlogging, in particular, near bridges and underpasses. Also, the upgradation of drains should be done at least seven to eight months ahead of the monsoon and not at the onset."
—S Velumurugan, principal scientist, Central Road Research Institute (CRRI)