As many as 11 cars were washed away in the overflowing Dahisar river Tuesday. (Express Photo by Amit Chakravarty)
EVEN AS they watched at least 11 cars being washed into the adjoining Dahisar river, residents of the Shanti Dwar housing society could do little on Tuesday. “Before we could think of anything, water gushed into our buildings. We could see the retention wall crumble. We even saw cars parked in the compound being washed away, and we could do nothing but watch as they fell into the river,” said Sakshi Malhotra, a resident of the building in Borivali East.
While the Shiv Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party race to seek credit for the proposed rejuvenation of the four rivers in Mumbai, for residents and activists around these rivers, it was a sense of deja vu on Tuesday. By 5 pm, water-logging was witnessed on Western Express Highway (WEH), creating traffic snarls, prompting the traffic department of the Mumbai police to shut the Chhatrapati Shivaji flyover between Dahisar and Borivali, adding to the traffic chaos below.
Meanwhile, musical instruments worth lakhs of rupees were damaged at Achievers Music Academy in Borivali East. “Even after water receded after 8 pm, there was mud and dirt all over the academy. Me and the staff have thrown buckets full of muddy water out, but it has damaged most of the drums and other musical instruments,” said Vijay Worlikar, co-owner of the academy.
Deputy Municipal Commissioner and in-charge of the BMC’s disaster control room, Sudhir Naik, said the Mithi and Dahisar rivers overflowed once on Tuesday afternoon. “Between 5 pm and 6 pm, it rained 70 mm between Andheri and Dahisar. The Poisar and Oshiwara rivers reached the danger mark too, but did not overflow,” said Naik.
According to Naik, around 7.30 pm, the river levels started to slowly recede, but by then the damage had been done. The retention wall built by the BMC after the 2005 deluge collapsed, as the river overflowed, flooding housing societies in Borivali and Dahisar. “The Chhatrapati Shivaji flyover had to be shut down as there was water-logging in Dahisar East. The Western Express Highway (WEH) in Borivali and Dahisar was also water-logged as the river overflowed,” said Harish Pande, activist and local resident. Pande added, “The traffic snarl was bad, people were stuck on WEH for hours.” According to Pande, Reliance Energy also disconnected power supply to all the buildings along the Dahisar river.
The Dahisar and Poisar rivers originate from Tulsi lake. “Generations of Mumbaikars don’t know them as rivers, they look at it as smelly ‘nallahs’ that flood in the monsoon. The Chitale commission set up to recommend remedies following the 2005 deluge, said the BMC in its Development Plans deliberately refers to the rivers as nallahs, so that river laws don’t apply to them. Under our campaign River March, we have been fighting to get these four rivers rejuvenated. However, neither the BMC nor the state government seems serious about it. Tuesday’s flood is yet another eyeopener,” said Gopal Jhaveri, resident of Borivali and co-founder of River March movement.
Sixty-year-old Ashok Rajbhatt has been bedridden for almost a decade after being paralysed. Rajbhatt could not move out of his home in Dahisar gaothan on Tuesday when water gushed into his house. The two-and-half-hour ordeal left him in shock. “I could have died, Ganpati Bappa saved me. I could not move, my wife was helpless and couldn’t get me out. After almost two hours people gathered and managed to move me out. The entire area was in waist deep water,” said Rajbhatt.
Another resident of the gaothan, Kalpana Bhoir said, “We have seen this after almost 12 years now. It first happened in 1983, when we had to leave everything and get out of the gaothan. The damage then was very less as most of us did not have any high-end appliance. After that we faced a similar situation in 2005. However yesterday’s flood has damaged our television sets and refrigerators.”
