With the monsoon predicted to hit Bengaluru in a little over 20 days, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike is scrambling to complete work on storm water drains (SWDs) even as citizens remain worried.
None of the SWD works that the BBMP had taken up have been completed. Of the 478 works identified — including stretches on which encroachments were cleared — only 167 have been taken up and work on them is still under way. The BBMP has taken up dredging of drains only in 19 stretches, which is also yet to be completed.
N. Manjunath Prasad, Commissioner, BBMP, said the civic body will soon take up construction of concrete drains at 110 stretches to replace kachcha drains. “Of the 110 drains, there are some stretches that are flood-prone. We have asked the SWD Department to take up work on the flood-prone stretches on priority,” he said.
While work on a new drain at Avani Sringeri Nagar, where encroachments were cleared after the July 2016 floods, is nearing completion, the construction of drains in other 42 stretches is far from over.
K. Sidde Gowda, Chief Engineer, SWD, BBMP, said they were working at a fast pace to avoid flooding at Kino Theatre and Nayandahalli junctions. BBMP is laying a pipeline from Kino Theatre junction to the SWD next to Mantri Mall that will take the additional water to the drain on a gradient. “The work will be completed in another 10 days. Once completed, there will be no flooding at the junction,” Mr. Sidde Gowda said.
New drains are also being constructed at Nayandahalli Junction, which attracts water flow from four roads. Work on this project, too, is yet to be completed.
D.S. Rajashekhar, president, Citizens’ Action Forum, said that it was sad that the civic body had not learnt its lesson.
“We saw scenes that one never could have imagined in Bengaluru – fishing on the streets and boat rides at BTM Layout. But the civic body is again caught napping before the monsoon. There seems to be no effort to address the issue at the pan-city level,” he rued.
