By IANS
Kolkata : Boats have become the only means of transportation in Kolkata as the capital of West Bengal remained flooded for the second day Wednesday after fresh overnight rains.
Boats are being used to supply dry food and drinking water in large parts of north Kolkata, especially in Ahmerst Steet and Sukhia Street areas where ground floor residents are living with murky rainwater inside their rooms. There is no electricity in several areas of the city.
The meteorological department here said the city recorded 174.2 mm of rainfall in the past 24 hours.
Train services to and from Kolkata were seriously affected for the second day Wednesday. All flights from the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International (NSCBI) airport, however, have been taking off since morning, airport director V. K. Monga told IANS.
Several local trains and long distance trains like the Delhi bound Toofan Express, Howrah-Ranchi Shatabdi Express and Jodhpur Express were cancelled, railway sources said. Bus services were also disrupted in Kolkata while cars got stranded in every part of the metro.
Resentment against the Left Front-ruled Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) has been mounting and people are calling up television channels to vent their ire.
Most of them blame Mayor Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya for not having done enough before the onset of monsoons to mitigate the water logging problems of the metropolis. The mayor was even surrounded for a while by the opposition Trinamool Congress councillors for the yearlong inaction.
"There is water logging but our pumps worked to drain out the water. We tried our best to pump out the water. You have to understand that our measures to improve the civic amenities would yield result in time. We hope the woes would be less next year," said Kolkata Mayor Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya
All examinations of the Rabindra Bharati and Calcutta Universities were cancelled Wednesday, said officials of the varsities.
Eight people died in Kolkata and two southern districts of West Bengal Tuesday due to wall collapse and electrocution, said police officials.
Six members of a family died early Tuesday morning at Bishnupur in South 24 Parganas district when a wall of their house collapsed due to heavy rainfall while one died of electrocution in the Madhyamgram area of North 24 Parganas district.
Police added that 21-year-old Moti Sheikh also died Tuesday morning after a wall collapsed on him in Entally area of central Kolkata.