Gurugram roads collapse after just 21mm of rain
Despite assurances by Gurugram authorities of being monsoon-ready, all it took was 21mm of rainfall to prove it wrong. After two main city roads at IFFCO Chowk and near Belvedere Towers Metro station caved in a fortnight ago, two more roads collapsed yesterday. The stretch at DLF Cyber City and the other near Sector 55-56 Rapid Metro station caved in yesterday, after showers.
While DLF has taken upon itself repair work of the Cyber City stretch, Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) officials said temporary arrangement will be made for the other road. According to a DLF representative, "a manhole got settled in and water had apparently cut the road," causing the cave-in. Meanwhile, in Sectors 55-56, a six-foot drain caved in next to the main road.
Mahesh Dayma, local MCG councilor, demanded GMDA should "make bigger drains so that monsoon water can easily flow through them." "At present, some drains are only two-feet wide," he added. GMDA confirmed plans are on to make bigger drains. Lalit Arora, Superintending Engineer, GMDA, said, "We are in the process of making bigger drains. But we'll take some time to execute the plan."
Residents are annoyed that with barely any rainfall, the roads are crumbling. "What'll happen during heavy showers? All city roads need to be checked immediately," said Prateek Panwal of Sector-12. Road experts seconded him. "There can be many unknown reasons behind cave-ins. For example, a pipeline. We cannot say till an investigation is done," said Sitaram Anjanyelu, Chief Scientist (Pavement Evaluation), CRRI.
Gurugram's problems are set to continue, as the MeT department has predicted more rain this week. However, "the rain wouldn't occur uniformly but at isolated places, and not as strong as it was on Friday and Saturday," said an official from Regional Weather Forecasting Centre.
