Monsoon clouds scare Nagarbhavi

With monsoon knocking on the doors of the city, the residents of Nagarbhavi are a worried lot. With neither the road nor the drain works complete they fear many parts of the area will face a deluge during heavy showers. There are heaps of uncleared garbage along the storm water drain and residents fear that many parts of the area will be flooded during heavy rains

Bengaluru: With BBMP officials deployed for poll duty, the development works in many parts of the city has suffered. At Nagarbhavi, the Storm Water Drain (SWD) has heap of garbage laden by its side with no provision for chain fencing.

"One can see the houses built close to the SWD. Everyday garbage is thrown and when it enters the SWD, it gets choked. SWD is supposed to carry rain water, but one can easily see the filth," said Ankur Bhardwaj, a local resident.

With met department officials forecasting that monsoon will arrive in city on Monday, the civic agency seems ill-equipped to deal with it and many people fear there will be a repeat of last year, when many parts of the city got marooned.

The BBMP has competed 145 km of desilting at SWD and identified over 366 vulnerable spots, where work needs to be carried out on a war footing.

However, Nagarbhavi residents fear the ongoing works may prove turn out to be a nightmare for them since neither the road work nor the drainage system is in place in many parts of their locality.

One of the commuters, Kiran Manjunath questioned the delay caused by civic agencies.

"Not only last year, but every year Bengaluru grapples with monsoon fury. How many more years does BBMP need to put the things in order?"questioned Mohith Raj, a student.

While visiting the spot, DC found that the garbage disposal system in the ward was in poor shape.

 K.N. Sharma, one of the nearby residents, lamented that the garbage burning was also rampant in the ward. "Due to the ongoing metro construction the traffic management is already in mess and on top of that walking on the footpath is next to impossible. In many parts the footpath is either non-existent or is laden with garbage," he added.

Recently, the city feature low in Swacch Bharat Abhiyan rankings despite drive to improve segregation at source. One of the reasons cited was that Bengaluru has visible waste in many parts of the city.

The BBMP aims to increase the segregation at source to 75% by the year end. 

We are prepared for the monsoon, says Bette Gowda, BBMP chief engineer (SWD) 
 What is the progress on storm water drains?
In 2006-2007, the BBMP started the construction of storm drains, which run for 842 km. Till date, 307 km has been completed. Desilting (removing 
mud after rain which is a continuous process as mud keeps coming in with rain) of 145 km has been completed.

How has the BBMP prepared for monsoon?
We are prepared. The BBMP has 65 control rooms with ready equipment like tree cutters, dewatering equipment and earthmovers. Each control room will have 10 labourers. We have a contingency plan in place to deal with the monsoon. 

Encroachments of lakes and storm water drains have been reported. How are you tackling it? 
The demolition drive will begin once the survey marking is done. The process was delayed due to the Assembly election code of conduct.