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Day after deluge, Kolkata struggles to stay afloat
The downpour, the heaviest in nearly four decades, inundated Kolkata and its outskirts and killed 11 people.
In the annual cultural calendar of Kolkata, Durga Puja sits right at the top. Preparations for the autumnal festival begin in the early summer months as artisans begin crafting idols from fistfuls of clay and organisers start hunting for sponsors and workers to erect their mega street spectacles. As the auspicious dates draw near, the city is wrapped in an envelope of bamboo barricades, glittering electronic archways, and hundreds of makeshift fast food stalls. Large organisers vie with each other for advertiser space, as do decades-old hoardings and new electronic screens. The police issue detailed traffic advisories, newspapers print guides and timings of communal rituals, politicians make lists of pujas to inaugurate, and droves of young people return to a city now seen as a poorer cousin to India’s biggest metropolises.
A six-hour-spell of torrential rainfall in the early hours of Tuesday put paid to all that.
The downpour, the heaviest in nearly four decades, inundated Kolkata and its outskirts and killed 11 people. It turned arterial roads into rivers, snapped Metro and local train services on Tuesday, and damaged some of Kolkata’s most famous outdoor puja pandals. It even made two crocodiles stray from their enclosure at the Kolkata zoo, before officials scrambled to put them back an hour later.
At the time of going to print, prominent neighbourhoods in Kolkata such as Ballygunge, Salt Lake, Patuli, Santoshpur and pockets of north and central parts of the city were still wading in deep water. Property worth crores has been destroyed. Hundreds of cars and other vehicles parked on the roads were submerged. In one of Asia’s largest open-air book markets at College Street, potential losses ran into crores as tattered books and soiled documents were seen strewn on the road.
As Kolkata attempted to limp back to normal on Wednesday, it was clear that the deluge had dampened the festive spirit that imbues the city with cheer during its favourite week of the year. And more rain was likely on its way.
Durga Puja celebrations in Kolkata first gained popularity in the 18th century, when it first started to slip out of the grip of aristocratic households. As colonial Calcutta swelled with merchants, professionals, and clerks, the worship of Durga escaped the courtyards of the wealthy into large community, or barowari, pujas. Modernity too lent its hand. The rise of printing presses spread devotional songs and images, while skilled artisans in Kumartuli etched idols each year. The freedom movement used the pujas as a rallying point for mass contact.
That tradition continues to this day, with the roughly 3,000 pujas across the city driving a ₹32,377-crorepuja economy in a city usually starved of capital. With just three days to go for the official beginning of the festival, organisers raced the clock on Wednesday to limit the damage.
“Two panels, made of plywood, near the exit gate of the pandal got washed away as the entire area was flooded. As the entire art work in the pandal is based on plywood, there was damage,” said Abhijit Majumdar, general secretary of the Singhi Park Sarbojanin Durga Puja Committee, one of the largest in the city.
Things were not so serene elsewhere. “The front portion of our puja pandal collapsed. The entrance was totally flooded and rainwater also entered the pandal,” said Sanjay Das, president of the Japur Jayshree Dum Dum club.
Some puja pandals reported damaged idols, including at the 85-year-old Maniktala Chaltabagan puja, where all idols except for that of the main goddess were ruined.
Artist Mintu Pal, who made at least 60 idols this year, said that he received frantic calls from puja organisers. “I received at least 15 calls today from various puja organisers for whom I made the idols. Their idols suffered damages and need to be repaired. Artisans, working under me, would be going to the pandals to repair the damages. We are working overtime and even at night,” said Pal.
At the New Garia Cooperative Housing Society, where around 500 families live, almost the entire area was under knee-deep water.
“The underground reservoirs, submersible pumps, garages are all under water in most of the houses. There are some houses where elderly couples live. They faced immense problems as domestic helps failed to come,” said Ambikesh Mahapatra, president of the society.
Drinking water shortages parched large chunks of south Kolkata, including middle-class neighbourhoods like Kasba.
In another residential society along the arterial EM Bypass in east Kolkata, electricity has played truant since Tuesday morning. “Leave aside the refrigerator, we can’t even operate the water purifier. We have to purchase drinking water. Puja lights have already been installed in the buildings but they are yet to be used,” said Sadhan Roy, a resident.
The waterlogging prevented many from leaving their houses. “We are supposed to leave for Puri by train on Thursday night. Water has entered the ground floor of our residence. It hasn’t drained out till Wednesday afternoon. We really don’t know what to do. We can’t leave the house like this,” said Shreya Pal, a resident of south Kolkata’s Baghajatin area.
Many were worried about their submerged cars. “We received 150 calls till around 3pm on Wednesday. Most of them reported damage to their cars because of waterlogging,” said an official of a car repair shop in east Kolkata.
At the Kolkata zoo, there were moments of panic when staffers noticed two crocodiles outside their enclosure.
“The zoo employees managed to keep 16 other crocodiles within the enclosure, but had a trying time in capturing the two others that strayed. After an hour, they managed to put those back inside with the help of nets,” an official said.
“There was no possibility of the crocodiles straying outside the zoo area, as the outlet connecting it with the Tolly Nallah (drain) has a net on its mouth,” he said.
The civic authorities in the British-era city often touted their achievement in refurbishing the city’s 150-year-old underground drainage system. But on Tuesday, it failed spectacularly.
“Tuesday’s flooding wasn’t just because of rain water. The water in the canals which crisscross the city also entered the city,” said Tarak Singh, member-mayor-in-council of the sewerage and drainage (S&D) department of Kolkata Municipal Corporation.
As the water receded, politics took its place.
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee inaugurated more than two dozen pandals. “Nature is not in our hands. Kolkata Port, Farakka Barrage, DVC’s Maithon, they have not dredged for the past 20 years. Whenever it rains in Bihar or UP, water flows into Bengal,” she said.
“The loss of lives due to electrocution and drowning is a stark reflection of the incompetence and apathy of those in power, who are now desperately trying to shirk responsibility,” BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari said.
As the sun came out on Wednesday afternoon, parts of the city appeared to return to the usual routine of puja giddyness. But there was little cheer in the households of the 11 people who died in the rain, most of them due to electrocution. Among them was a hotel security guard who died while operating an inverter, an elderly man who came into contact with an exposed wire on a flooded road, a man who was electrocuted while cycling through a waterlogged street, one whose body was found floating on an arterial road, and another whose died while working in a shop.
