No respite from waterlogging, civic body tall claims fall flat

Sukhmeet Bhasin

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, June 25

After pre-monsoon showers a few days ago, the civic body faced the wrath for its failure to prevent waterlogging in the city.

Now, Mayor Balwant Rai Nath has written a letter to the nodal officer, appointed to supervise the desilting work in the city, asking him to get critical manholes and gullies cleaned at the earliest.

Waterlogging has become a major problem every year and despite spending huge money on resolving the issue, the city is yet to get relief.

Tall claims made by MC officials always increase the hopes of residents to get rid of issues such as sewage overflow and waterlogging during the monsoon. But, the pre-monsoon showers that lashed the city a few days ago dashed the hopes, leaving low-lying areas waterlogged.

The lackluster approach of the MC has raised a question over its working. Residents question that why does not the MC start preparing for the rainy season in advance?

Mayor Balwant Rai Nath said, “After rain in the past few days, some areas had submerged due to which I have written a letter to nodal officer Raman Kumar and asked him to get the desilting work of critical manholes and gullies done at the earliest in the city.”

Senior Deputy Mayor Tarsem Goyal said, “Desilting of road gullies is more important that of manholes. I have not seen any desilting work taking place anywhere.”

VB Shivangi, DGM, Triveni Company, said, “As many as 2,800 blocked manholes have been desilted and around 1,000 are still left in the city. The work is going on.”

Gurmeet Singh, a resident, said, “It seems that the authorities have learnt no lesson from the past. Every year, city roads get waterlogged after rain. The MC had made tall claims that drains would be cleaned before the monsoon, but nothing has been done yet.”

Another resident Gian Chand Bansal said, “A huge amount of money has been spent on finding a solution to the waterlogging problem. But at the grassroots level, the situation is not changed. Even public representatives continue to claim to make Bathinda a world-class city, but people have failed to get any relief.”

Question over working 

• Tall claims made by civic body officials always increase the hopes of residents to get rid of issues such as sewage overflow and waterlogging during monsoon. But, the pre-monsoon showers that lashed the city a few days ago dashed their hopes, leaving low-lying areas waterlogged.
• The lackluster approach of the MC has raised a question over its working. Residents question that why does not the MC start preparing for the rainy season in advance?