BHUBANESWAR: Three hours was all it took for the rains to bring the state capital down to its knees. Flooded arterial roads, overflowing drains, inundated streets and residential colonies exposed the city’s urban governance as rains lashed Bhubaneswar on Monday evening. Met officials said the city received 258 mm of rainfall between 8.30 am and 8.30 pm on the day. An IMD tweet said, Bhubaneswar recorded 72 mm rain between 5.30 pm and 8.30 pm. It was good enough for a deluge.
Last time Bhubaneswar experienced such a deluge was in 2018. It was déjà vu five years later. With the city’s flawed drainage system remaining almost the same, residents’ misery was unchanged. Commuters had a harrowing experience as major roads in most parts of the city remained flooded, leading Bhubaneswar in a gridlock. The usually busy Janpath passing right in front of Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC)’s swanky office was inundated with sanitation workers seen trying to salvage the situation. Commuters had to drive through knee-deep water along the Raj Bhawan-Jayadev Vihar road, another critical road of the city. Vehicular traffic came to halt on the fly-over near Kalinga Stadium’s main gate as storm water overtopped on NH-16.
The situation turned so grim that vehicular movement had to be suspended on the busy Ratha Road connecting Lingaraj shrine for over two hours due to flooding on drainage channel no 7. With drains and stormwater channels remaining encroached in almost all parts of the city, residents were subjected to unspeakable misery. A dozen of housing complexes in Old Town and 20 residential houses in Gouri Nagar were flooded after the heavy spell of rain. The stormwater combined with sewer from clogged and overflowing drains gushed into residential areas of Jagamara damaging possessions and valuables of many households in the locality.
Heavy rain left people marooned in Rajiv Nagar and other localities exposing the lip service BDA and BMC have been doing to crackdown on encroachments and improve city’s drainage facility. In Jayadev Vihar, the drain No 4 pushed huge volumes of water onto the residential areas where BMC has been undertaking beautification work without desilting the water channels.
BMC commissioner Vijay Amruta Kulange who visited different areas to take stock of the situation admitted that almost all natural drains started overflowing after the short spell of heavy rain.
He, however, said field staff were mobilised immediately to deal with the situation effectively. “Pump sets were commissioned in low-lying areas, while all BMC engineering and sanitation wing staff were sent to the field to clear water-logging,” he said. Kulange said fire services teams were engaged, while ODRAF teams were on alert in view of the IMD forecast.