NAGPUR: Heavy rains lashed Nagpur city and adjoining regions on Thursday, leaving most areas in South, East, North and South-West Nagpur waterlogged and traffic disrupted. The new Manish Nagar railway underbridge too was completely flooded, exposing unplanned infrastructure development works in the city.
TOI spotted disruption of vehicular traffic on Great Nag Road, Inner Ring Road (especially the patch between Chhatrapati Square and Narendra Nagar underbridge), Manish Nagar railway underbridge, Padole Hospital square and other roads. Due to waterlogged roads, traffic on Chhatrapati Square to Narendra Nagar RuB, Manish Nagar RuB, from Swawlambi Nagar Square to Radhe Mangal Karyalaya was diverted to other roads, traffic police said.
As the rain intensified, health officer (sanitation) Dr Pradip Dasarwar, superintending engineer Manoj Talewar and chief fire officer Rajendra Uchake were monitoring the city from the command and control centre (COC) at NMC’s new administrative building. Watching through CCTV surveillance cameras installed across the city, sanitary workers were pressed into service to clean inlets of blocked stormwater network, especially on waterlogged roads and squares like Shankar Nagar, Sadar Coffee House Square, Ashok Chowk (on Great Nag Road), Jagnade Square etc. It helped to drain away the water rapidly.
District guardian minister Nitin Raut, municipal commissioner Radhakrishnan B, chief executive officer of Nagpur Smart and Sustainable City Development Corporation Limited (NSSCDCL) Bhuvaneswari S, additional municipal commissioners Ram Joshi and Jalaj Sharma visited the COC and monitored the dewatering works of sanitary workers and fire department.
Fire control room of the NMC’s fire and emergency services department received many phone calls pertaining to waterlogging, especially in residential localities. “Rainwater entered many houses damaging household articles in Vandevi Nagar slum near Kalamna market, Telephone Nagar in Dighori area, Kalyaneshwar Nagar in south Nagpur among many other residential localities,” firemen on emergency calls told TOI.
With poor or damaged drainage systems, rainwater was pouring on motorists beneath flyovers like Sadar’s Y-shaped flyover and double decker flyover on Wardha Road.
Construction of Pardi flyover and Metro Rail work has damaged the stormwater network near Old Pardi Naka Square on Bhandara Road thus leading to rainwater gushing into shops at Prasad Apartment. Property worth lakhs of rupees was damaged due to rainwater entering over 50 shops here, said local resident Rajendra Gaur.
Jai Jawan Jai Kisan president Prashant Pawar along with his supporters stormed the flooded Manish Nagar RuB and protested against MahaMetro.
To a query about waterlogging on busy patches of Inner Ring Road, a senior official from NMC’s public works department said they had written several letters to the state’s public works department regarding faulty construction of stormwater networks in many patches of Inner Ring Road. But the state agency has not taken any corrective measures till date, the official admitted.
