BENGALURU: Forecast of more rains and overcast skies since early Thursday morning with slight drizzle has caused worry among citizens of rain-battered Bengaluru, who were preparing to get back to routine, after some respite the previous day and water level in flooded areas receding slowly.
Residents of localities and apartments that were inundated are making attempts to drain out water and remove sludge from their houses and basements.
Some badly affected areas continued to remain in darkness without power supply and non-availability of drinking water, even as officials maintained that efforts were on to restore supply by repairing the damages.
While waterlogging on roads in most parts of the city are by and large clear, making way for easy movement of vehicles, some stretches along the Outer Ring Road and Marathahalli and nearby areas are said to be still facing some issues with vehicular movement with water still on roads.
Also, potholes continue to haunt city's motorists, especially two-wheeler riders.
Some residents of flood-hit localities and apartments, who had moved out to safer locations like either relatives or friends' places or hotels are getting back to their homes to assess the damage, and to carry out cleaning work.
"With the situation improving slightly, I have come to check my house, and to get it cleaned, but there seems to be a shortage of pumps to remove the remaining water, as they are in good demand now, also labourers to remove sludge. Will have to look out for them now. There is also a power cut. Hope we don't receive more heavy rains," a resident at a locality near Yemalur said.
Another resident in Marathahalli, who lives in an apartment, sharing a similar ordeal said, hope there are no more heavy rains, it's been cloudy and drizzling since morning though.
Generators and power back-up equipment of apartments whose basements were submerged in flood waters have all mostly been damaged.
Also, according to officials restoring power supply to apartments whose basements are still waterlogged is not not safe.
Owners trying to attend to or getting their vehicles like- cars and bikes- that were either partially or fully under water due to flooding, were a common sight in parts of these areas.
The Meteorological office in Bengaluru in its forecast on Thursday morning for the city for the next 48 hours has said one or two spells of light to moderate rain or thundershowers were very likely.
Technology companies, which bore the brunt of recent flood due to heavy rains in the city, on Wednesday aired their grievances before Karnataka IT/BT Minister Dr C N Ashwath Narayan, urging him to find a solution to the rain-related woes.
At a meeting convened by Narayan to discuss the problems caused by the unprecedented rainfall, the representatives of several IT companies said their primary concern was to bring to the notice of the government the miseries they faced and the losses incurred.
In reply, the Minister assured them that the state government will help find a permanent solution to the infrastructural issues in the Mahadevpura zone, which witnessed water-logging, by next year.
"Narayan also sought the cooperation of tech companies to retain the status of 'Bangalore Brand'. A virtual meeting will be conducted every month from now on to resolve the grievances of entrepreneurs," a statement issued by the office of the Minister.
He also said that the government will examine implementing the Electronic City Industrial Township Authority (ELCITA) model of system that is being put in place in the Electronic City in the Mahadevapura zone as well.
The meeting comes days after torrential rains and flooding affected the tech corridor in the capital city.
Representatives of Goldman Sachs, Infosys, Wells Fargo, Wipro, Mphasis, Intel, TCS, Accenture, Sonata Software, Philips, Solace were among those who attended the meeting.
E-commerce companies, especially their delivery boys, had a harrowing time to supply products to the customers when certain parts of Bengaluru was under deluge due to two days of heavy rains in parts of the city.
The inundated areas such as parts of Sarjapura, Bellandur, Varthur, Whitefield and Outer Ring Road had become inaccessible due to water-logging.
In view of the flood situation, these e-commerce companies had suspended their services for some time.
An executive of a leading e-commerce company told PTI they had to suspend services in certain places as it was not possible for anyone to reach there.
"We are waiting for some time to see things settle. Things seem to be improving now in some places," the executive said.
Meanwhile, an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement, "Safety of our associates is our top most priority. We are evaluating the situation, and ensuring that our associates do not venture in areas with excessive water logging."
"Cases where customer deliveries have been impacted, we have informed them proactively", the statement read.
The food delivery company Swiggy had also put on hold delivering products in the inundated areas, an executive told PTI.
It told its clients in the flood-hit places that they may not be able to reach it and apologised for it.
"Things now seem to be improving. Many areas are becoming dry now and our delivery partners are able to reach there," the executive said.
The city had received heavy rainfall for two days resulting in floods in many areas.
A rain-related death occurred in which a woman died of electrocution.
Meanwhile, the city civic agency, Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has started the demolition drive razing encroachment of lakes and stormwater drains interrupting smooth flow of rainwater.
Here is what the weather bulletin saying
Heavy to very heavy rainfall is predicted over a few places in coastal and south interior Karnataka on September 8-9 and interior Karnataka on September 9-10, according to the India Meteorological Department (IMD).
"A cyclonic circulation lies over interior Karnataka and neighbourhood. A trough runs from cyclonic circulation over east-central and adjoining the southeast Bay of Bengal to north Kerala across Rayalaseema and south interior Karnataka," it said.
While experts have attributed the flooding in IT capital to encroachments on the stormwater drain and water bodies which impede the flow of rainwater, excess rain has also played its part.
According to IMD data, the Bengaluru City observatory recorded 251.4 mm of rainfall in the last four days, including 131.6 mm on Sunday, the highest 24-hour precipitation in September in 34 years.
Before this, the observatory gauged 132.6 mm on September 26, 2014.
The all-time high is 177.6 mm recorded on September 12, 1988, senior IMD scientist R K Jenamani said.
The Bengaluru HAL Airport Observatory recorded 271.2 mm of rainfall during this period, including 123.8 mm on Sunday.
The Bengaluru KIAL Observatory reported 158 mm of precipitation in the last four days, including 109.6 on Sunday.
"This is not a localised phenomenon. We have seen large excess rainfall over Tamil Nadu, Lakshadweep, north interior Karnataka, south interior Karnataka in the last one week," Jenamani said.
On September 3-4, a convergence line extended from Comorin area to north interior Karnataka at lower level.
A convergence line is a band of cloud that remains fairly stationary and can produce large amounts of rain across a relatively small area.
Thereafter, a cyclonic circulation formed over south interior Karnataka.
It lay near Bengaluru on September 4 night.
A local Met official said a shear zone deposited heavy rains in south interior Karnataka including Bengaluru city on Sunday.
A shear zone is an area filled with opposing winds concentrating heavy rain in that zone.
According to the IMD data, Bengaluru Rural gauged 752.3mm of rainfall against a normal of 303.5mm between September 1 and September 7 -- an excess of 148 per cent.
Bengaluru Urban received 168 percent surplus rainfall -- 840.2mm of precipitation against a normal of 313.2mm -- during the period.
In August, Bengaluru received 370 mm of rainfall, a little short of the all-time record of 387.1 mm of rainfall in August 1998.