Dug-up fields turn into swamps after showers, not fenced

Gurgaon: The Bajghera area in Sector 110 has no designated water bodies. Adjacent to the Dwarka Expressway, it is rapidly concretising as it waits to follow the same template as the neighbouring sectors littered with highrises.
For now, it has vast open spaces, fields and plots that are lying in hibernation for the real estate harvest.
All of these have turned into swamps and marshes after a late monsoon charge in September and the current spell of post-monsoon rain. None of them had any barricades to prevent trespassing or warnings when TOI visited the area on Monday, a day after six children drowned in an inundated plot they had assumed was a large pond where they could swim.
There are multiple such sites in Bajghera, connected with semi-urban localities such as Chandan Vihar and Shankar Vihar. With construction of highrises pending, developers often level the fields or dig them up, leaving behind excavations that collect water after spells of rain.
“These patches accumulate a lot of rainwater and no one knows their depth, making it even more dangerous,” said Ganesh Kumar, a resident of Bajghera.
Others who live in the vicinity said their children would often go into these plots to play.
“The incident was shocking. I have told my kids not to go to the fields, at least until the rains are over. No one could have imagined this. What must their (the children who drowned) parents be going through,” said Kamlesh Singh, who lives in Sector 110 and runs a shop in the area.
When asked, the district administration said it will survey the area for such construction sites. “We will try to identify similar accident-prone areas… We will drain the water out,” said Nishant Kumar Yadav, deputy commissioner.