By IANS,
New Delhi : A continuous downpour that began overnight and lasted through Thursday threw the national capital completely out of gear as chaos reigned.
Rains, one of the heaviest this season, once again caused the same disturbing scenes to be played out again and again – flooding in low-lying areas, uprooted trees, dysfunctional traffic lights, traffic snarls, harried commuters and scared school children who were caught up for hours on end on chaotic roads.
And once again it showed up the unpreparedness of civic authorities to restore normalcy on Delhi’s roads as the heavy rainfall, measuring 112 mm, disrupted normal life.
Commuters who set off for their offices in the morning had to battle waterlogged roads, non-functional traffic signals, vehicle breakdowns and serpentine queues of cars, buses, two-sheelers and auto-rickshaws. Disorder reigned on the streets almost throughout the day.
Most affected were the Ring Road, one of the city’s lifelines, the Dhaula Kuan crossing and the Delhi-Noida Expressway. Traffic crawled at less than two kilometres an hour in places like Khanpur, Hauz Khas, Indraprastha Estate, Munirka, Ashram and Naraina during rush hours.
Traffic lights that number over 700 failed in several areas, causing huge tailbacks, at times stretching up to more than a kilometre.
Many children reached school late and several office-goers decided to work from home to avoid being stuck on the roads. Some left home but turned back halfway, and those who left early to try and avoid the inevitable jams found it was a futile exercise.
Delhiites had a litany of woes.
“I reached more than an hour after the usual time. The attendance was also very low in the school. A lot of buses had not reached the school due to rain,” said Anushka Baruah, a student of Class 8 of the Shri Ram School, Gurgaon.
“It took me nearly an hour to reach office on Rao Tula Ram Marg from my home in Subroto Park. On a normal day, it takes a maximum of five minutes. I was on a bike. Those in buses were in really bad condition,” commuter Naresh Kumar told IANS.
“The expressway only got me to the jam faster,” complained a young executive who left his Gurgaon home at 8 a.m. for his office in central Delhi, only to get stuck at Dhaula Kuan. More than two hours after he left home, he still hadn’t reached office.
Santosh Kumar, who works in a private company, said: “It took over 90 minutes to cover a distance of just three kilometres.”
According to the India Meteorological Department, the city received over 112 mm of rainfall till 5.30 p.m. Though the rains brought the temperatures down to pleasant levels, the Weather Office forecast that the rain would continue for a couple of days – a foretaste of more trouble.
At the Mehrauli-Badarpur Road near Batra Hospital in south Delhi, a section of nearly 400 metres of road caved in due to which several buses were stalled for hours.
People alleged that the quality of the material used to construct the road was substandard as it was repaired only 20 days ago.
The commotion that ruled Delhi forced some offices to ask their employees to work from home.
“Our office is shut today. We are working from home as it is impossible to reach office in time,” said Aarti David, assistant manager in publication house Sage India.
“Delhi plans to become a world-class city but it is a shame that we cannot manage traffic and waterlogging on an exceptionally rainy day. Last evening, it took me more than two hours to reach my father’s office which is barely three kilometres away from my office in Mathura Road,” David told IANS.
Power outages were also reported in many areas after overhead electrical cables collapsed. And as has been the case in the past, several roads were flooded with water from choked drains.
The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) control room was inundated with complaints of flooding in several residential areas.
The civic agency received 63 complaints of waterlogging and 26 of trees falling across the city, an official said.
The heavy downpour and the chaos it brought again exposed the city authorities’ claims of making Delhi a global city that is to host the Commonwealth Games in 2010, the cricket World Cup in 2011, and make a bid for the 2014 Asian Games.
“The blame game will begin again after the chaos. The city government will blame the MCD, which in turn will blame the fury of nature. The Public Works Department (PWD) and Delhi Police have to share the blame for their failure to manage arterial roads and traffic respectively,” said Krishna Kumar, a employee of an IT firm.