The drain along the Bharathi Park Fifth Cross Street is choked with dry leaves and other waste. Most parts of the drain that runs south-north are no different. In another part of Bharathi Park, the condition of the drain is no different.
The waste has covered so much of the drain that it is on a par with the road surface.
A few km south of Bharathi Park, in Ramnagar the drain on Sathyamurthy Road is also similar - waste and debris have filled it to the brim.
In Marudhur, Nanjundapuram East and their neighbourhood too the drain is choked. The drain is so full of silt that after a drizzle, the sewage flows on to the road, complains resident R. Ravichandran. The residents say that the sewage stagnates and flows on to the road because there is no outlet.
P. Shanmugasundaram of Cheran Nagar, in Ward 61 (Ondipudur) says that the locality has been suffering inundation for the past 10 years because of poor sewerage system.
Across the city, most drains are choked with waste and filled with stagnant sewage that could spell for the residents ahead of the South West Monsoon.
A corporation report says that the city has over 800 km drains. The corporation constructed a good portion of it under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission in such a fashion that the drainage led the sewage/drain water to the nearest natural drain.
But given the poor condition of the drains, the water will quite likely flow onto the streets than the other way round, says Bharathi Park resident S. Balamurugan.
The residents say that they want the Coimbatore Corporation to conduct a special drive to clean all the drains in the city or conduct special cleaning drives focussed on drains ahead of the monsoon.
Sources in the corporation say that a special drive was already on. Senior officials during their daily inspection routine were also advising field staff to focus on cleaning drains. They were doing their best and that if there were complaints, they would attend to those.
