Take a tour of the Uma Maheshwar Colony beside Fox Sagar Lake in Jeedimetla and the sight of quite a few recently-painted houses is sure to greet you. Some houses in between, however, will stand out like a sore thumb, with locks hanging on the worn-out doors.
The vibrant look of some houses is not to mark the festive season. Residents had to repair and repaint their homes following catastrophic rains which lashed the city exactly a year ago, on the night of October 13, flooding the locality up to 10 feet. Not to mention, electric wiring, wooden furniture and electronic equipment were completely damaged. Only the pillars and walls were left standing, say locals.
Every house in the locality suffered a minimum loss of ₹50,000 to ₹2 lakh as their household good and valuables that they could not carry to safety bore the brunt of the floods.
In the aftermath, many residents of the locality had to go make extensive repairs to their houses. Some did not even return to do that.
Depending on the distance of a house from the lake, it took three to seven months to clear the flood water and sludge.
Distressing memories of hand-picking important documents and valuables while running away to safety on the night of October 13 last year is still fresh in their minds. Some of them recalled the chaos that ensued after they started to evacuate from the colony following a flood warning.
“It took seven months for us to clear out all the water and sludge. Apart from incurring damages of ₹1 lakh or more, we spent another ₹70,000 for rent in Kompally. We returned home after seven months. You can see many of our houses have new doors and have been repainted,” says Rama Raju who has a family of eight.
Another resident of the locality, P. Venkat Raju shudders as he recalls how their homes were destroyed.
“We had to replace electric wires too. Only pillars and walls were strong enough to withstand the deluge,” he says, standing near his water dispensing store.
“The richer a home, the greater the damage. Poor people live on basics,” chimes in Sujatha, another local.
Kompally Municipality 13-ward councillor Ravi Yadav says there are around 500 houses in Uma Maheshwar Colony and all of them, save for a few, were flooded.
Every time it rains heavily, the residents get on their toes and frequently check the water level in their lanes. Their plea to engineers who take care of the lake is to keep multiple sluice gates open so that their locality is not flooded again.
