The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Showers pose problems for residents of southern suburbs

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Sunday, Jan 06, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Showers pose problems for residents of southern suburbs

Special Correspondent

Miscreants damage outlet at Moovarasampettai lake

Members of Water Bodies Exnora attributed it to the failure of the government machinery in strengthening the bunds

— Photo: A.Muralitharan

RAIN EFFECT: Chakrapani Street was one of the localities in Keelkattalai that was inundated after surplus water from a lake nearby entered the areas on Saturday.

TAMBARAM: Showers on Thursday and Friday posed problems for residents of the city’s southern suburbs.

Compounding their woes, the sprawling Moovarasampettai lake near Tambaram was reportedly breached by miscreants on Saturday, resulting in the water entering localities in nearby Keelkattalai.

Residents of a couple of localities complained that the water entered their houses. Normally, the surplus lake water would flow into the Madipakkam Lake, but water channels on the route are choked and poorly maintained.

In the early hours of Saturday, the outlet point (‘kalangal’) was damaged, resulting in water stagnation in some places in Keelkattalai and also in Moovarasampettai.

Members of Water Bodies Exnora attributed it to the failure of the government machinery in strengthening the bunds and weirs.

More than two dozen tanks and lakes in the southern suburbs are sandwiched between Velachery Main Road, Medavakkam Main Road and the Pallavaram - Thoraipakkam Radial Road. Originally, these water bodies were linked with each other.

Welcoming the government’s initiatives to build minor bridges across Radial Road and Velachery Main Road, the activists said these projects would facilitate rainwater draining into the Bay of Bengal through the Buckingham Canal.

However, priority should be given to restoring the water channels linking the water bodies, deepening and desilting of lakes and strengthening their bunds.

If this was done on a massive scale, water storage capacity would increase and prevent stagnation in pockets of Madipakkam and Keelkattalai.

Bad roads

Problems caused by the rain in the form of damage to roads and traffic snarls persist.

K.A. Santhosh, Joint Secretary of the South Chennai District unit of Democratic Youth Federation of India, said residents were in no mood to complain as their repeated appeals and protests to highlight the poor state of amenities in Madipakkam and adjacent areas failed to sensitise the government machinery. The surface of arterial and interior roads had become extremely bad and travelling on them was a nightmare, he said. There was no improvement in traffic problems on the main roads as motorists were trapped in massive snarls for a long time.

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