Hundreds of residents of Nelamangala, 20 km from here, spent sleepless night on Saturday as water from the nearby Amani Kere, which breached due to heavy rain, entered into their houses.
While the Bangalore Rural district administration officials struggled to deal with the situation, the angry residents protested against the alleged illegal encroachment of the raja kaluve (main storm water drain) which led to the current situation.
“We were in deep slumber and suddenly felt cold. When we woke up, we saw water all over. When we came out, we realised that no one was aware of what was going on. For a moment, we feared that we all would be washed away in the water like in Uttarakhand,” Indramma, a resident of Chennamma Layout at Nelamangala, said.
MLA Dr Srinivas Murthy, along with the local officials, helped people clear water from their houses and deodorised the area.
“The bund was temporally closed to ensure that water will not enter the town from the lake,” he said.
The disiltation work of the 50-acre tank was taken at a cost of `2 crore last year. But the contractor delayed the work, Murthy alleged.
He also said that the water from Binnamangala Lake also gets into Amani Kere through raja kaluve. People have encroached a large part of the drain, he charged.
Nelamangala tahsildar V Rajendra said, “The district administration received the information regarding the precarious situation at Saturday midnight. I rushed to the spot with engineers and we created a passage to divert water from this drain to other drains leading to Binnamangala Lake.”
“People told us that they had to face such a situation due to encroachment of the raja kaluve. We will conduct a survey on Monday and if there is any encroachment, we will initiate action (against the guilty),” Rajendra said.
He said the desiltation work is on. The contractor has put separate pipes in the tank bund area. Due to heavy rain, the soil caved in resulting in the flood. But now the situation is under control, he added.
On Thursday, Nelamangala taluk received a rainfall of 70 mm rain fall. It touched 80 mm on Friday. It recorded a rainfall of 66.8 mm on Saturday.