More drains are needed to stop flooding at Hindmata

Mumbai: As claimed by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) earlier, the Britannia pumping station alone would not be enough to alleviate flooding problems at Hindmata area. The civic body further needs to lay additional drains to tackle the flooding issue there.

Laxman Vhatkar, chief engineer, storm water drains department of BMC has said in his reply that additional drains need to be installed to prevent waterlogging at Hindmata. When contacted, Mr Vhatkar refused to comment on the issue.

The reply says that the Britannia pumping station can handle only 50 mm of rainfall in an hour. The Hindmata area received about 170 mm of rainfall, which was way above the pumping station capacity, leading to the spot getting water logged.

To prevent flooding at Hindmata, additional drains needs to be laid as the capacity of present drains, which are underground and constitute 25 percent of sewer lines only cannot be increased.

Additional drains from Madkebuva chowk to Lalbaug to Kalachowkie are required to discharge floodwater. “At spots like B.A. Road, Patankar Road, water entrances should be increased by laying pipes,” he said in his reply.

In case of Gazdarbandh pumping station, the commissioning was delayed due to mangroves problem. There are about 150 mangroves, which had to be removed discharge channel of pumping station. How-ever, the permission to remove mangroves was received from MoEF only on June 8, he said in the explanation.

Following the flooding problems faced by the city during the heavy rainfall on June 12 night, civic chief Ajoy Mehta had issued a show-cause notice to Mr Vhatkar holding him responsible for waterlogging woes.

He was asked to explain reasons behind the flooding at Hindmata on June 12.