BJP councillor Davesh Moudgil sought accountability of spending such a hefty amount when it was not of any use. (Express photo by Sahil Walia)CITY RESIDENTS will have to bear with waterlogging as Chandigarh civic body appeared helpless when the issue was raised by councillors in the general house on Monday. Interestingly, this helplessness came after the corporation has already spent a whopping amount of Rs 1.25 crore on merely cleaning the road gullies. This year, there were special directions from UT Administrator V P Singh Badnore to ensure no waterlogging takes place in the city.
Officers said that their “road gullies cannot handle water if the rain is over 25 mm”. On the first pre-monsoon shower, the city received 29 mm rainfall and was left flooded. Sectors from 1 to 30 have capacity of road gullies up to 25 mm while road gullies in southern sectors upwards of Sector 30 can handle only up to 15 mm rain.
BJP councillor Davesh Moudgil sought accountability of spending such a hefty amount when it was not of any use.
“This work could have been done in an amount five times less than this. I need an answer as to why city got waterlogged when it was claimed that this cleaning of road gullies was done,” Moudgil said, adding that waterlogging was also spoiling the newly recarpeted roads.
He added that the workers pull out garbage from the road gullies and pile up the same near the place and when it rains, it all flows back to the road gullies. “Why can’t we have an overhaul of the drainage system?” he asked. But it was stated that there were no funds with the MC.
While taking officials to task, Mayor Rajesh Kalia said that at a stretch of one kilometre, it took him three hours to cover it last Saturday as the roads were heavily clogged. “We have spent so much of money and still we can’t do anything about waterlogging,” Kalia said.
With no satisfactory call from the officers, the councillors then just spoke about different suggestions, which are given in almost every such meeting during this season.
BJP councillor Arun Sood said, “Obviously, when we tumble the whole bucket of water in the drain of our house, it takes little time for the water to drain out. But I had suggested that we must have super suction machines for the cleaning of road gullies.”
MC Commissioner K K Yadav said that “there is no city where water will drain out in a minute during rains”.
