A little rain, Delhi becomes a drain

Pix: Babu

By: Sheeba Naaz and Kinley Tshering

Rain, rain go away. Come again another day. Delhiites sure must be chanting this but with a pinch of salt.

In the wake of continuous rainfall over the last few days, pockets of the Capital are water clogged. According to World Weather Information Services, Delhi’s mean total rainfall for August is 258.7 mm.

Delhi’s poor drainage system gets clogged every time it rains. The water spills over on the road along with the sewage. And this has been a problem for motorists and commuters alike as they had to wade through the ankle-deep water.

Leave apart the roads in the colonies, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi is not even bothered about the drainage system near its own office. After the heavy rainfall on Friday the road nearby the MCD office at Sarai Jullena was flooded. “The irony is that the water is getting clogged just near an MCD office and they aren’t doing anything,” says Yangchen Lhamo, a student at the National Institute of Mass Communication.

MCD’s inefficiency to respond to the drainage problems has infuriated many.
“The Uttam Nagar main road is flooded with water these days but the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) has not taken any action so far. Our complaints have fallen on deaf ears,” says Onkar Singh, a resident of Om Vihar at Uttam Nagar.

He further adds, the MCD officials to whom he complained asked for money to take up the task. “They said it is a government office and without money they won’t be working.”

However, the officials and people’s representatives to the MCD have their own reasons.

Jamaluddin, an MCD councillor of ward number 206, Jamia Nagar, says the problem of water clogging in Batla House main road is not new. In fact it has persisted for the last 15 years. The main problem is that there is no outfall for the sewage water and the water needs to be pumped out.

When asked why precautionary actions were not taken before the monsoon, Jamaluddin says it could not happen in a day either. “To come up with a permamanent solution for the problem it will take six months to a year’s time. Temporary arrangements could have been made within a month but temporary solutions are not the answers,” says Jamaluddin, who is also a civil engineer.

The increasing load on the drainage system also seems to be taking its toll. The number of people using the drainage system in the area has increased from 400-4000 in the recent years, according to the Congress candidate.

Meanwhile, the likes of Syeda Rizvi, a resident of Okhla Vihar, feels that since there are no proper drains for the clogged water to flow, they will have to depend on the mercy of the sun to dry up the water.