Bengaluru: Thunderstorm in city, roads flooded

Bengaluru: Heavy rains accompanied by thunder and lightning lashed the city on Tuesday evening. Within no time roads turned into streams.

With no proper de-siltation of side drains and storm water drain, the sudden downpour caused water logging in many areas.

Traffic was thrown out of gear and cricket enthusiasts were unhappy as the IPL match was curtailed and later called off due to rains.

BBMP control room sources said that tree fall incidents were reported from Infantry Road, Maruti Circle and Adugodi, but maintained that there were no complaints related to water logging.

As per rainfall data accessed from Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre, Pulikeshinagar, falling under Bangalore North, recorded 120 mm rain per hour, while V.V. Puram recorded 74 mm per hour and  Bommanahalli recorded 70 mm.

City Mayor Gangambike summoned executive engineers to be on high alert and immediately attend rain related complaints.

She also asked them to identify flooded areas and take steps to prevent flooding.

Monsoon: K’taka in high risk category
On the monsoon prediction, he said, “The Indian Meteorological Department has predicted normal or below normal monsoon this year. Even private weather forecaster Skymet has predicted that monsoon will not be so good this year.”

Karnataka, which witnessed a severe drought during last monsoons, is marked under the ‘high risk’ category by Skymet.

“It is not a good sign, as Karnataka is already among other states that were declared drought prone last year. Going by the prediction, Karnataka falling under the high-risk category is not good,” he said.

Maharashtra, Telangana and parts of Andhra Pradesh are also under the high-risk category, along with Karnataka.

Mr Gavaskar said, “The IMD has released the first long-range forecast in April and we will get more clarity on the situation once the IMD releases its second forecast by May-end or June first week.”