90% of big drains cleaned, says Patna Municipal Corporation

PATNA: With monsoon knocking on the doors of Patna amid the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, officials of the city civic body are on their toes to handle rain-related civic issues.
While inspecting the waterlogging prevention works in the state capital on Thursday, commissioner of the Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC), Himanshu Sharma, claimed that 90% of the big drains had already been cleaned.
Sharma, who led a team of officials of the PMC and the Bihar Urban Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited, assessed the situation in waterlogging-prone areas like Rajendra Nagar and concluded that the rainwater was drained away in less than two hours.
At present, PMC workers are sanitizing different areas, cremating bodies, managing the session sites set up for the vaccination drive, running community kitchens and performing monsoon preparedness works.
PMC’s public relations officer Harshita told this newspaper, “During the last two months, the primary task of our workers was to conduct disinfection drives for curbing the spread of coronavirus and manage corpses. Now that the monsoon season is around the corner, they are also being engaged in drain and manhole cleaning works.”
Bodies continue to be cremated: As the number of Covid deaths remains high, the visuals at Patna’s crematoriums are chilling. Altogether eight corpses had been cremated at the Bans Ghat alone by 1pm on Thursday. “April was a nightmare because nearly 70 corpses were cremated every day. The process of cremating one body takes around 45 minutes and 400 kg wood,” said Raj Kumar, who looks after the Bans Ghat crematorium. Covid corpses are also being cremated at the Gulbi, Khajekala, Digha and Nandgola ghats.