Guwahati’s flood-prone areas

With the monsoon season not very far away, it is time for the authorities to take a close look at the drainage, water-logging and flash-flood problems of Guwahati. The first heavy shower that the city had experienced on April 6 has already given an early warning by inundating parts of Jorabat, Nine-Mile, Khanapara and Juripar. It is heartening to note that a team of senior officers comprising Principal Secretary of the Guwahati Development Department, accompanied by the Kamrup (Metro) Deputy Commissioner, the GMC Commissioner, the Guwahati Metropolitan Development Authority CEO and others from the National Highway Authority of India, District Disaster Management Authority, Guwahati Municipal Corporation and others made a ground-level survey of certain flood-prone areas of the city on Saturday. What the team found on the ground however is anybody’s guess. Number One – the drainage system of the city is extremely faulty; Number Two – the drains and natural streams are not regularly desilted; Number Three – the GMC does not remove garbage on a daily basis and does not clean the roads; Number Four – the citizens throw garbage in drains and natural streams and are not penalised; Number Five – increasing encroachment of the city’s hills have caused more mud and silt to flow down and block the drains; Number Six – public servants who get their salary from the tax-payers’ money are not held accountable for all the above. There is no denying the fact that the Guwahati Municipal Corporation comprises a bunch of officers who are largely inefficient and do not know how to do their designated job. Likewise, the elected members of the GMC are hardly bothered of the ground situation once they get through the election. At Dispur, the higher authorities are only confined to files that contain notes which are thoroughly filtered up the process so that all they get to see is a rosy picture of the city. While it is appreciable that a team of officers visited some of the flood-prone localities, what they should have also done is to have interacted with residents of those localities so as to actually understand what happens to them when there is a heavy shower. The officials would have then understood how those at the ground level do not do their duty with sincerity and with due diligence. The officials would have then also understood from the local residents which are the crucial spots where the floods originate and water-logging takes place.