National capital Delhi saw life having been thrown out of gear for the second day today as majority of the areas inclduing posh Lutyens, remained waterlogged, making movement of the commuters miserable. Even as Chief Minister Rekha Gupta directed swift action to alleviate sufferings of people and visited some severely affected areas, relief was far from sight with regard to movement of traffic and hardships faced by pedestrians.
It was a spell of heavy rain on Tuesday morning which actually threw the national capital into chaos with key roads from fashionable Connaught Place to ITO were waterlogged, triggering traffic chaos across arterial routes and inconveniencing commuters. The scene though not new to these places, there was this expectation of some relief assured by the BJP government which did not work this monsoon as well. Confident of its upgraded preparedness, Delhi governement too was caught unawares to see large scale waterlogging even in areas where it was not seen to the extent in the past.
Utter chaos and uncontrollable situation on some roads forlong stretches sparked off a political war of words over the monsoon preparedness. The opposition Aam Aadmi Party took several potshots against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), even as Chief Minister Rekha Gupta and Public Works Department (PWD) Minister Parvesh Sahib Singh highlighted swift action by the government to ensure the return to normalcy across city roads. Though pumps were put in place to divert the direction of water accumulated on the roads, it offered no respite, given the depth of the water that was up to knee level .
Pertinently, it was the highest rainfall logged in a day last year (July 26) was 39.4 mm.Following Tuesday’s downpour, the monthly average rainfall in the city surpassed the long-period average of 195.8 mm. The total rainfall so far this month stood at 220.2 mm, as per IMD data.Connaught Place, Pragati Maidan, Panchkuian Road, showed long traffic snarls and commuters struggling to navigate waterlogged roads after heavy rain in Delhi. So was the situation of the roads in many areas of west Delhi where commuters struggled to move due to huge traffic jams on account of submerged roads. The national capital actually turned into a pool at some places which became worth highlight on social media by the opposition AAP.
Sharing videos of waterlogging on social media platforms, AAP functionaries claimed that the city completely "collapsed" within five months of BJP forming the govt. "Despite tall claims and promises of proper management by CM Rekha Gupta and PWD minister Parvesh Verma, even a brief spell of rain on Tuesday morning was enough to bring the national capital to a standstill," the party alleged. "Waterlogging inundated not just the inner streets but also the city's most posh localities, exposing once again the complete failure of BJP's so-called ‘four-engine' govt to deliver even basic civic infrastructure."
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