BENGALURU:The recent rains in Bengaluru have brought nothing but woes to a group of young boys from Rajasthan who reached the city recently looking for work. Ironically, while the boys, in their early 20s, work during the day laying underground sewage pipes and fixing leakages, a leak next to the tent where they stay has been flooding their home for the past three days.
Fashioned out of tarpaulin, the tent is on a road next to a huge pit which has been dug up to repair a pipe leak. For the past few months, BWSSB has taken up the work of laying sewage pipes underground. Since they did not have a house to stay, the group put up a tent using tarpaulins next to the 10ft pit. Measuring around 8ft X 8ft, the tent is home for the five who bundle themselves in and sleep. The tent serves as their living room, kitchen and storeroom. They have to walk on sandbags to enter their tent.
However, the group quickly got used to the perilous conditions and were living peacefully until the rains. “It is a temporary tarpaulin tent, water enters in between, all our clothes become wet. Even the blankets have become cold owing to dampness. Water enters the tent every night now,” said one of the boys.
To shield themselves from rainwater, they have tried a variety of solutions. “We have a few tarpaulin sheets left. Whenever we see water coming from one side, we try to spread this tarpaulin on it, so that quantity of water entering our tent is reduced,” the boy said.
These young boys not just cope up with rainwater entering their tent, they also live in a dangerous spot.
On one side of the tent is an open drain,with no safety barricades. The other side is dug up and filled with water.
Continuous or heavy showers, like the ones the city has been witnessing recently, means that the pit is filled with water which is a threat as well. To cope with this, the boys have been given a motor to pump out water of the pit.
When the issue was brought to the notice of BWSSB chairman Tushar Girinath, he said workers are not direct employees of BWSSB as the work is outsourced to contractors. “However, it is inhumane to make any person live in that unhygienic and vulnerable place. I shall ask the officials concerned to visit the spot and direct the contractor,” he said. The boys did not wish to be named.