Delhi’s 48-year-old drain network, intense rains continue to cause fatalities

New Delhi

The death by drowning of three UPSC aspirants at their coaching centre’s basement in Rajendra Nagar on Saturday is the latest in a series of rain-related deaths clocked by the Capital this monsoon, especially over the past month.

There have been 18 rain-related deaths this monsoon, of which seven pertain to electrocution.

Waterlogged streets and flooded underpasses have led to a spate of electrocutions due to loose wires, with the Capital’s unpreparedness laid bare and the recurring incidents exacerbated by civic agencies and departments concerned being caught wanting, in terms of magnitude of response to the situation.

Even localised spells of moderate to heavy rainfall have led to inundation of streets as the city continues to depend on a 48-year-old drainage plan. Experts say that instead of taking a piecemeal approach, Delhi needs drastic changes to its monsoon preparedness.

Read more: UPSC aspirants death: Opposition calls incident ‘man-made’ disaster, attacks AAP

The situation is further compounded this year due to heavy spells of rainfall that have hit Delhi in short spells, since the arrival of monsoon on June 28 in a record-breaking rainfall of over 220mm in a single day, causing a collapse at the IGI Airport Terminal 1, killing a cab driver, and electrocuting a 39-year-old man to death in Rohini.

The IMD classifies rainfall as “heavy” when over 64.4mm is recorded in 24 hours. After June 28, parts of Delhi recorded heavy rainfall on July 24, when 80mm of rainfall was recorded at Pusa, followed by 73mm at Pitampura. On July 26, 99mm was recorded at north Delhi’s Ridge, followed by 93.5mm at Delhi University, while an almost heavy rainfall spell of 58mm was recorded in a six-hour period at Pusa again on Saturday evening, which led to waterlogging and flooding of the basement on Rajendra Nagar.

Delhi lieutenant governor VK Saxena, in an official statement, said on Sunday: “That this (deaths) should happen in the Capital of India is most unfortunate and unacceptable. Reportedly 7 other citizens have died due to electrocution in the past few days...These incidents clearly points towards criminal neglect and failure of basic maintenance and administration by concerned agencies and departments. Drainage in the City and related infrastructure, as also required efforts and endeavours to address these have apparently collapsed.”

Urban development minister Saurabh Bhardwaj also raised questions about the desilting.

Read more: UPSC aspirants death: MCD seals 7 properties, 3 basements for violating by-laws

In a social media post, he said: “Everyone is saying that the work of removing silt from drains and sewers in Delhi was not done properly. Due to this, there was waterlogging in entire Delhi. Due to the same waterlogging, many people died due to electric shock in Delhi. It is the negligence of the coaching institute but a big conspiracy has been hatched against the people of Delhi. The government can neither transfer these officers nor take any action against them. Only LG can take action.”

Atul Goyal, president of URJA, an umbrella body of RWAs in Delhi, said: “We have been caught unprepared. The tall claims of the mayor and agencies to have completed the desilting have been proved false by the rains. On the one hand, we are talking about the upgradation of drainage plans, but here, we are unable to even clear our drains. We need a new mechanism to monitor the implementation.”

On July 3, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) announced that more than 100% (103.37%) of the desilting target had been met for drains under its jurisdiction. The claims have been contested by citizen groups, given that the annual monsoon action plan sets a deadline of June 15 for the exercise.

The deaths

On June 29, two boys reportedly drowned to death near the flooded Siraspur underpass, a day after a 60-year-old drowned in the waterlogged Okhla underpass. On the same day, two boys aged around eight and 10 years drowned in a rainwater-filled ditch in northeast Delhi’s New Usmanpur. On June 29, the bodies of three labourers were pulled from the mud slush and rubble of a wall that collapsed at a basement construction site in the Vasant Vihar area.

Among the latest deaths by electrocution was a 45-year-old man who died at his home in Sadar Bazar on July 24. This came two days after another UPSC aspirant, 26-year-old Nilesh Rai, was electrocuted after slipping on a waterlogged road and grabbing an iron gate — which was in contact with an exposed motor wire — for support.

On July 20, a 30-year-old worker died in Karawal Nagar around 12.30pm at a construction site, shortly a week after a police head constable was electrocuted on July 13 while investigating a theft case in Najafgarh. Other deaths include that of a BSES employee who was fixing an electricity pole in Dwarka and a 34-year-old woman in Bhajanpura. While some of these deaths were due to waterlogging, some were just victims of coming in contact with exposed live wires.

Old drainage system

Delhi’s existing drainage plan is 48 years old, having been devised in 1976, and it can handle around 50mm of rainfall in a 24-hour period. Currently, around 50% of the sewerage and drainage networks are mixed, to alleviate stress on the old network, but this also causes the issue of water backflow.

Bhavreen Kandhari, an environmental activist, said the problem is linked to crumbling infrastructure and poor implementation of existing laws. “Our existing drainage infrastructure is meant to handle the population we had in the 1970s. We are well past that period, but are failing to revamp it. Our drains and wires also require proper maintenance and regular drives, which appear to be lacking at the moment,” Kandhari said.

A government official said that when the drainage master plan was prepared, it was done with the existing population of Delhi in mind, which was only around 6 million. The plan was to help sustain the city for another two decades or so, before requiring change. Presently, Delhi’s population is around 25 million, according to the Master Plan Delhi 2021.

Meenakshi Dhote, professor of environmental planning at the School of Planning and Architecture (SPA), said waterlogging occurs every monsoon, primarily due to Delhi ignoring its natural slopes. “This has been compounded by piecemeal modifications of drainage, leading to new high areas and low areas, where water eventually collects,” she said.

Dhote recommends not only studying the slopes of the area where construction is taking place, but also understanding the slope of the sub-basin to ascertain where the site lies. “Drainage from any area to surroundings and whether the surrounding drain has the capacity to take the added run-off should also be understood,” she said.

Diwan Singh, an environmental activist who has worked on reviving water bodies across the city, said: “To a large extent, these deaths stem from the issue of waterlogging, which is partially due to the fact that our drainage system is old and not suitable for the current population the city holds. It is also not able to handle any intense spell of rain, as the drains only have limited capacity, and are not maintained adequately.”

“We also have a design flaw that all drains are supposed to empty into the Yamuna. However, by the time these drains carry this water to the river, they start to overflow and flood local areas. Instead, we need to use stormwater wherever possible, diverting it to water bodies,” he said.