How late night action cleared the stagnation

CHENNAI: State government officials engaged in rain relief operations spent a sleepless night on Thursday as the mild evening showers gradually turned into a torrential downpour, pounding Chennai overnight inundating roads, streets and habitations.

The mood in the control room at the State emergency operations centre located at Chepauk in Chennai was grim as officials, led by Commissioner for Revenue Administration (CRA) and Relief Commissioner K Satyagopal and Minister for Revenue and Disaster Management R B Udhayakumar, as information trickled in about the fury of the monsoon.

“We were indeed worried about how we were going to cope with the situation at daybreak,” Udhayakumar told Express on Friday. He added, “Our foremost aim at that point in time was to restore normalcy as much as we could.”

A contingent of 1,900 employees of the Greater Chennai Corporation was deployed overnight to clear stagnant water. They braved the showers and successfully completed their task with the help of high-capacity motors in many places in the city before people began to spill out on the streets on Friday morning.

Besides the Corporation staff, locals too lent a helping hand to clear the roads and streets of stagnant water.
Satyagopal said, “All top officials of the Corporation and other government departments were out on the road to monitor the situation and speed up relief activities. The local community too played an important role in bringing back normalcy.”

According to a Corporaiton official, as many as 338 places were identified as water-clogged and 1,133 employees involved in relief operations. Water was pumped out at 102 places overnight while efforts were on in the remaining places.

Thanks to the pace of relief activities undertaken on a war footing, the authorities breathed easy when they were able to bring back normalcy in many places and mitigate the fury of the monsoon.