City’s roads 4,000km, drains cleaned along only 369km

Nagpur: The Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) sanitation department, which carried out stormwater drains cleanliness drive ahead of monsoon, claims to have covered “369.23km of the 389.86km network in the city”. On the other hand, the city has a road network of over 4,000km, out of which only 960km have stormwater drains, as per data available from the NMC public works department.
The inadequate drainage network is the main reason why waterlogging is witnessed in many areas every year even after moderate rain.
Sources pointed out that the city’s existing stormwater drains have a capacity to handle only 20% of precipitation pressure. At many places, the existing stormwater network also carry sewage, leading to choking and sewage overflow.
The cleanliness drive had started in April. Sanitation department officials claimed that this year the stormwater drains are almost cleaned. “We learnt a lesson from last year’s experience. In 2019, torrential rains caused many stormwater drains to overflow and inundated several areas,” the official said and added that property worth lakhs was destroyed due to water gushing into homes or shops.
In 2011, the NMC had prepared a detailed project report (DPR), according to which the city was divided into three zones. The north zone, which has many new areas and Nagpur Improvement Trust layouts, has very poor stormwater drain network. The north zone has around 323.48km of drain network while it needs drains along 1,690km of road length.
The central zone has existing stormwater drain network of 461km against requirement of 961km. South zone has 176km of network, while 1,390km is needed.
As per the data procured from the sanitation department, workers from 10 zones cleaned 17,377 outlets out of 18,208. Remaining 831 will be cleaned soon. The figures are available till May 28.
Apart from cleaning stormwater network, NMC workers also cleaned rainwater chambers. Out of the 23,512 chambers, 21,917 were cleaned, the data revealed.
The NMC has also completed cleaning of 201 out of 227 nullahs. Out of the 201 nullahs, 151 were cleaned manually while the rest with the help of machines like excavator.
STORMWATER NETWORK WORKS
Task———————————----Cleaned
Cleaning 23,512 chambers --———-21,917
Cleaning 20,622 outlets ---17377
Cleaning drains along 389.86km ---369.23km
(Data provided by NMC sanitation department)