BENGALURU: “It was a nightmare come true. I was asleep when my husband noticed sewage water gushing into our house at 4.40am. This happens almost every time it rains a lot. So we kept our food items aside. But after a while the water level increased to as high as 5 feet. For a while I thought I wouldn’t survive this rain. I feared for my life,” said 42-year-old Chitra, a resident of ST Bed Layout in Koramangala 4th Stage.
That is when her son Mutthu came to her rescue. He helped her get outside the house slowly. He then told her to take shelter on a tractor that was parked on the roadside. “Five other women, who are my neighbours, had also got onto the tractor with me to save their lives. We stayed put on the tractor for nearly seven hours,” she said.
Chitra irons clothes for a living. Her family of four has faced similar situations in the past too, but never had they imagined that this time the rains would pose a threat to their lives. Never had the water levels risen so high in just over four hours of rain.Chitra and the other women took with them rice, wheat and other essential food items to the tractor so that they don’t get washed away. “My husband and son also gave me some clothes to keep myself warm,” she said.
Meanwhile, the men climbed on the walls of a house nearby.Almelamma, another woman who took shelter on the tractor, said, “I also carried some food with me to the vehicle. The situation was so scary that I am yet to recover from the shock.” Almelamma lives in a hut next to Chitra’s house.
It was only around 12.30pm that the water level started to recede. The families then returned to their houses to clear the water from inside their houses.
“We have been living here for 20 years now. Rains give us a tough time every year. But this time it was scary. Never had we feared for our lives,” Almelamma said.
Mutthu said that he had called BBMP officials for help. But they in turn asked him to call the higher officials. “In fact, a few BBMP and Fire Department vehicles were making rounds in the vicinity but nobody came to help us,” he said.The day was just as difficult for those living in the bigger apartments. People living on the ground floor had to seek shelter in the floors above.