As many as 32 people perished in the unprecedented deluge caused by the incessant rains across the state of Telangana.
Hyderabad city, which is dubbed as a global city when everything is fine, bore the brunt of the heavy downpour.
Rapacious construction activity encroaching upon the catchment areas of the hundreds of lakes in and around city is said to responsible for the flooding of the city. Interestingly it is periodically proven and proven without any proper corrective measure.
Hyderabad floods exposed the nexus of GHMC plus Political class in allowing the encroachment of nalas that fed the lakes in the city.
Since corruption is an incurable disease in our state (or country as well), there is no option other than forgetting it after a cynical review of the situation. People, political parties, and officials forget it and again restart their paeans for the 400-year-old city.
Following the flood situation, the Telangana government had to declare holidays until Thursday for all private and public institutions.
In the past 48 hours, the so-called old city is entirely submerged in the ferocious floods. Apart from NDRF, the army had to be called in to help in rescue operations.
Hyderabad city alone reported 18 deaths and the toll is likely to go up.
October 13, 2020, has gone down as the rainiest day in the history of Greater Hyderabad as the city received the entire month’s rain on a single day. The city received 324 mm rain in just 24 hours.
According to officials the last when the city received that much of rain was on August 24, 2000. On that day city’s rainfall of 241.5 mm triggered flash floods in many areas.
Moksha Gundam/MVIRDC
The city received 268 mm of rainfall between October 1 and October 14 with the highest i.e.191.8 mm being received on October Tuesday alone.
Surprisingly almost all the lakes which have been encroached upon reclaimed their original lands by flooding the colonies, buildings, and apartments and driving away the residents to rescue camps.
The areas which saw unusual flooding were the ones that sprang up in the lakes illegally or regularised thereafter under the amnesty scheme of the government.
Activists said as many as 191 lakes have encroached upon in Hyderabad and the process is going on unabated. According to Lubna Sarwat, noted activist, yesterday’s floods in the areas of Bandlaguda and Palle Cheruvu were the result of encroachment of the local lakes.
Breaches occurred to the bunds of Mailardevarpallik, Telllapur, Begumpet, Madhapur, Rmanthapur, Malkajgiri, Pallecherivu.
Hyderabad’s Musi River, which is now converted into a big stinking sewage drain overflowed for the first time in decades.
Many said they had not seen a Musi with the bank to bank flood in their life time. What all they know was news of Musi floods of 1908 in which as many as 50,000 people died.
It is well recorded in history. The massive damage to the Hyderabad city in Musi floods warranted the Nizam to request Mokshagundam Visweswaraiah to prepare and execute preventive measures on war-footing.
Despite repeated floods and heavy rains, such a genuine attempt to save Hyderabad from rains has not been made either in the united Andhra Pradesh or Telangana.
The Seventh Nizam had genuinely felt the immediacy to take up the flood prevention measures. Though many suggested him to appoint some British Engineers to take up the massive task, Nizam preferred only Indian expert that too Mokshagundam Visweswaraiah of the then Mysore government. Such was the influence of Nizam, the entire British Indian government had to be alerted to locate and requisition Visweswariah who was holidaying in Italy.
Can we expect the Telangana government to emulate Nizam and take up the job of repairing the environmental damage honestly without transforming the effort into a vote-catching exercise?
