Mild rain makes slush pool of roads, suburbs cry for better infrastructure

Data obtained from the Tiruvallur Collectorate said Tiruttani received 44 mm of rain, the highest in the district, followed by Pallipattu (39mm), Gummudipoondi (38mm) and Uthukottai (34 mm).

Red Hills and Chembarambakkam, where two of the reservoirs supplying water to the city are located, received 22.8mm and 4.5 mm respectively. However, this was enough to inundate the low-lying areas in the region, leaving the people to bear the brunt of it.

T Padmanabhan (51) from Tirumazhisai said his neighbourhood, which consisted of low-lying areas like Chemabarambakkam, Kuthambakkam, Vellaivedu, etc., had water-logging issues every year. “While the State is promoting Tirumazhisai as a satellite city on the lines of Anna Nagar, it is a low-lying area where nothing is being done to prevent water-logging,” Padmanabhan said.

If there was heavy rainfall in next couple of days, the government should take safety measures, he added, pointing out how around 15 villages in the region were severely hit by heavy rain last year.

Umapathi (47), a social activist from Pakkam, said his neighbourhood had not been provided with proper roads and thus even a little rain was sufficient to make the mud roads unusable. “Due to the poor condition of roads, residents in Raghavendra Nagar, Sripathy Nagar, Balaji Nagar and Srinivasa Nagar are suffering from water stagnation. Children deal with many hardships to negotiate the roads to get to schools,” he said.

The suburb of Ponneri was also affected as the main road linking the place to Pulicat witnessed water-logging. “It has been an ongoing problem for the past 15 years. There is a subway along the road which always gets flooded. Nothing has been done so far to alleviate the issue,” said VR Harinagarjun from Ponneri. According to him, low-lying areas like Perumbedu, Umibedu, Kirappakam, and Pookulam villages had also been affected.

District officials said they were acting on citizens’ complaints as soon as they were raised, maintaining that they were prepared to handle flooding and other emergencies in the event of torrential rain.