More articles by

Niranjan Takle
Niranjan Takle

Mumbai rains

Politicos blame nature for waterlogging as Mumbai loses top doctor in manhole

mumbai-in-water A boy pulls his bicycle through a flooded street during heavy rain in Mumbai | AFP

Mumbai had a 300mm rainfall on August 29 that brought the financial capital to a standstill. Lakhs of people had to seek shelter at every possible place, including bus stops, Gurudwaras, mosques and railway stations. Many organisations and residents came out voluntarily to help those stuck in traffic or in the waterlogged areas. Western railway, central railway and the harbour lines of the local trains, considered as the lifelines of Mumbai, were not plying trains for over 12 hours. Fourteen people lost their lives, including Dipak Amrapurkar, a reputed gasteroenterologist of Bombay Hospital.

Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, who addressed a press conference along with BMC commissioner Ajoy Mehta after the water receded, was furious when asked about the failure of the BMC's drainage system. “You should have stopped the rain,” he said, adding that it was an unprecedented rain fall.

He chose to forget the fact that Mumbai had experienced a 945mm rainfall on the July 25, 2005 that had brought the city to a standstill and that truly was an unprecedented rain-fall.

Thackeray and Mehta pointed out in the press conference that the drainage system can drain out only 50mm rainfall every hour.

“In the last 12 years since then, Shiv Sena-BJP who have been ruling the BMC for the past two-and-a-half decades, have spent over Rs 36,000 crore on drainage, de-siltation of Meethi river and the nullahs, but couldn't even develop a system to drain out 300mm rainfall,” Congress spokesperson Sachin Sawant said.

Mumbai Congress president Sanjay Nirupam said, “Rs 36,000 crore to create a drainage system for 50mm rainfall is a case of gross corruption. Especially after experiencing the havoc in 2005 with 945mm rainfall.”

The chief minister's office was busy circulating pictures and videos of everything that Devendra Fadanvis was doing that day. CM had also spoken to TV channels about how he personally went to the disaster control room and discussed measures to be taken with the police commissioner and the BMC commissioner. “He didn't tell common people that his office is on the sixth floor and the control room is on the ground floor of the same building. Commissioner's office is on the corner of the road and he could have simply called them on his cell phone. It is a shame but the govt is happy doing only optics,” Nirupam said.

Devendra Fadanvis and Uddhav Thackeray had praised the 'spirit of Mumbai' and the resilience shown by the people. However, 14 people had died at various places due to the waterlogging, including a top doctor and a renowned lawyer. Amrapurkar was driving home and his car failed at a waterlogged street just before Prabhadevi where his house is located. He got out of his car to walk down but drowned in an open manhole in the street. His body was found only after 32 hours.

Priyen Methia, a lawyer, had gone to Gandhi Market in Sion, but got stuck inside his car because the central locking of his car failed to operate. The water around rose and he died inside. Nirupam said, “It is shameless to hide the inefficiency and corruption behind the 'spirit of Mumbai'. What is the value of human life? Why the manhole was not adequately surrounded by barricades and the red flags to alert the pedestrians?”

The Indian Medical Association has issued a press release condemning the inefficiency and failure of the BMC and has stated that the IMA will take due legal action, holding BMC responsible for the death of Amrapurkar.

This browser settings will not support to add bookmarks programmatically. Please press Ctrl+D or change settings to bookmark this page.
Topics : #Mumbai | #Maharashtra

Related Reading

    Show more