From bliss to mayhem in just four hours

It all started on a promising note early Tuesday morning. Loud thunder and flashes of lightening, soon taken over the sound of rain drops. The air was at its best of the season and the greens were brightening up. However, by 7am when it was time for residents to go to work and for children to attend school, the mayhem had taken over.

DLF 1 resident Tanya Sharma stepped out at 7am to walk into chaos on the waterlogged roads. “I was jolted awake around 4am because of lightening. I noticed it was very bright outside for a few seconds. I was still looking out the window when I heard a deafening sound. It was nothing like I’ve ever seen before,” the private school teacher recounted.

Sharma reached her school late and was completely drenched much like hundreds of other commuters, who were stranded on the roads.

Sunil Singh, who had been waiting for his cab for 30 minutes at a Metro station, said though the monsoon stirred up some of his fondest childhood memories, the rain on Tuesday wasn’t anything to cherish. “When we were in school, we used to request our teacher to give us some time off so that we could go out and have tea. Back then, monsoon felt like a celebration. Now, the only saving grace is that air pollution goes down and skies clear up.”

The concentration of PM2.5, one of the major air pollutants in the city, went down to 37 µg/m3 (the CPCB standard is 60µg/m3) — the season’s lowest so far.

The weatherman has predicted more rains in the coming days. According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD), spells of moderate rains are expected this week.

The forecast got software engineer Mandvi Pundir, who works with a telecom firm, worried. ”I come from Bhopal. The city receives heavy rainfall too but there is hardly any waterlogging,” she said.