Hyderabad: Officials plan pumping out rain water

Hyderabad: A day after the massive gridlock in the IT corridor where roads turned into rivers after one hour of rainfall, officials decided to keep pump sets ready at all the 160 waterlogging points in the city to pump out water in the event of heavy rain.

Police officials have asked the GHMC and city water board to speed up and complete road-digging works in the IT corridor.

GHMC commissioner M. Dana Kishore, Cyberabad police commissioner V.C. Sajjanar, additional commissioner, traffic, Anil Kumar and other officials held a coordination meeting on Saturday where these decisions were taken.

“Due to the sudden heavy downpour, all nalas got choked which led to waterlogging,’’ Mr Sajjanar told Deccan Chronicle.

He said that the 10.5 mm rainfall that was recorded in Cyberabad was very high. Due to the various construction works going on in the IT corridor, water got accumulated on different roads along with the debris.

“Within one hour, the entire area was flooded. Being a peak hour and that too on a Friday, when most employees would be returning home, it led to massive traffic jams, especially between 5 pm and 6 pm,” he said.

Mr Sajjanar said what compounded the problems was that several motorists began driving on the wrong side of the road to avoid stalled traffic, which led to more traffic snarls. “We have decided to take all measures to prevent such instances in future,” he said.

“We will have pump sets stationed at all the waterlogging points,” he said. All roads had become slippery due to the debris and this was due to the various ongoing road digging works, an official said.