Rain pushes 7 feet of water into 1,000 houses in Bengaluru

As overnight rains stole their peace of mind and sunk their precious belongings, residents kept wondering about their choice of place to build houses.

Owners of more than 1,000 houses, especially the lakefront buildings, waited all through the night for the dirty water to recede so that they could clean up their homes. In some houses, the water level went up to seven feet.

The worst hit areas include parts of RR Nagar, Nayandahalli, Horamavu, Vadrapalya, KR Puram, Mahadevapura, Indiranagar, Hosakerehalli, Yelahanka, Govindarajanagar, Mahalakshmi Layout, Dasarahalli, HSR Layout, Seshadripuram and HBR Layout.

In Pramod Layout near Nayandahalli, advocate Yogesh M R, his dentist wife and college-going daughter were busy cleaning their house. Watching floodwater creep into the house, they hefted the refrigerator on top of a table. An electrician was seen repairing the damaged power cables, including an invertor.

“We couldn’t drink a drop of water since morning,” Yogesh said. “We had to clean the sump first before allowing fresh water in.”

A stone’s throw away, software engineer Naveen Kumar was hard at work cleaning the muck from his house. “I had reached the layout at 8.30 pm, but I had to wait for two hours just to reach home as the entire road was filled with neck-deep water,” he said.

“We had shifted some of our belongings back to the ground floor after the BBMP rectified the rajakaluve. This time, too, the layout flooded as water entered from a different place,” Naveen added.

A resident of Sai Layout, Horamavu, Dayanand charged BBMP officials of failing to rectify the drain narrowed down due to the railway track.

“Over 350 houses have been flooding for the fourth time in the last two years. The authorities are aware of the problem, but their approach lacks urgency and seriousness. The officers responsible should be sacked,” he said.

Compensation

Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai announced that all homes that got inundated in the heavy rains will get Rs 25,000 each. He reviewed the rain mess at Hosakerehalli and Rajarajeshwari Nagar.

Bommai said the city’s roads will be fixed as soon as all ongoing works are completed. A task force has been constituted for this. “Works on underground drainage, gas line, Cauvery V stage, telecom cables, electricity lines and others have started together,” he said, explaining the problem of bad roads.

“There is a forecast that the rain will continue for 2 to 3 days. Instructions have been given to take precautionary measures,” Bommai said.

Vittal Mallya Road flooded

Praised as a well-planned stretch, Vittal Mallya road was one of the worst hit in Tuesday’s rains. Motorists had a tough time ploughing their vehicles through the three-feet of water the heavy downpour had dumped on the city.

Officials blamed incomplete stormwater drain repair work for the havoc.

“A private firm had dismantled the drain to build a new one. Since there were a few pipelines in the drain, the work was delayed. This led to flooding of Vittal Mallya Road,” a BBMP official said, referring to the drain work between Starbucks and The Biere Club restaurant on Lavelle Road.