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No respite for Bengaluru as heavy rains continue to wreak havoc
Since the beginning of October, Bengaluru has received 77% more rain at 140 mm as against the normal 79 mm, the Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC) said. At least 21 lives have been lost till now since October, it said.
As heavy rains continue to lash Bengaluru, several areas were inundated leaving homes, cars and property submerged along with the lives and livelihoods of people residing in low-lying areas of the city.
Since the beginning of October, Bengaluru has received 77% more rain at 140 mm as against the normal 79 mm, the Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC) said. At least 21 lives have been lost till now since October, it said.
Videos of the flooded basements and homes surfaced on Thursday with people sitting on elevated objects to avoid the water. There was at least three feet of water in several basements, damaging cars and other valuables.
On Wednesday night, the overflow from Madiwala lake entered basements of homes and apartments, damaging cars, disrupting electricity and other valuables.
The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), however, said that there has been no flooding in the city and it has been less noticeable compared to earlier years.
“There has been no flooding this year and almost very less noticeable this year,” Gaurav Gupta, the chief commissioner of the BBMP told Hindustan Times on Thursday. Gupta said that after heavy rains, water remains on roads for a couple of hours and drains out on its own.
As citizens continues to face the brunt, social media was flooded with videos of people and their property inundated as heavy downpour continue to batter the city since the beginning of the month, which is said to be the highest in decades.
Meanwhile, the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) has predicted heavy to very heavy rainfall at isolated places over Karnataka for the next three days.
Earlier on Monday, the city started witnessing heavy rainfall which later cause a flood-like situation.
Several areas, including the Kempegowda International Airport (KIAL), were waterlogged following heavy rainfall in the city.
Bengaluru houses over 12 million people or nearly a quarter of Karnataka’s population and its rapid and unplanned expansion has led to encroachment of lakes, storm water drains and other natural wetlands that traps the water on concretised roads, damaging more than it can benefit.
Officials from the KSNDMC said that the rules of disaster management applies even to Bengaluru during rains with ex-gratia paid to the families of people who have lost their lives, damaged homes and other repairs.
The Karnataka government pays ₹5 lakh for a full demolished home in a city where the average per square feet cost is around ₹4,000-5,000.
There have been at least six buildings that have collapsed in Bengaluru since the last week of September with two collapsing just on Wednesday.
There have been several people who have lost their homes as buildings continue to collapse in the city on account of poor construction, low maintenance, violation of plan approvals and not following basic civil engineering principles.
“What happened is that due to continuous downpour at a number of places, the soil and the strata have got saturated with water which has led to some kind of weakening of the binding strength of the soil or load that has led to certain building wall collapse,” Gupta said.
Gupta said that there were 185 buildings that were in a dilapidated condition when the city corporation carried out a survey in 2019 of which only 10 have been demolished so far.
The city corporation ordered a rapid survey on September 29 which has shown that an additional 300 buildings require urgent attention.
Gupta said that the BBMP will not advise on how a building must be built as it would be difficult for the officials to vet every building in the city. He said that the BBMP can’t just tear down a structure and will have to serve notices to owners.
