In view of the impending monsoon, cleaning of drains and desilting work is going on in full swing and the whole task is aimed to be completed by the end of this month, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said today.
"Seventy six per cent of Mithi river desilting work has been completed, while 66 per cent of drainage desilting is over. Besides, we have so far done 35 per cent of minor nullah clean up work. Our team has fixed the target of completing the whole task by this month's end," said Sanjay Deshmukh, Additional Municipal Commissioner of BMC.
Major drains in the city have collective length of 252 km and minor drains run up to 420 km.
"The geographical position of the city is like a saucer, which ostensibly retains rain water when there is a downpour of 50 ml in an hour. If it is coupled with high tide of over four meters, then there is the possibility of waterlogging which we are gearing up to tackle," Deshmukh said.
He claimed that this year people will not have to face acute water logging problems like in the past.
"We have identified over 270 such spots and provisioned 290 portable pumps of bigger capacity to flush out rainwater from such low-lying areas," the official said.
He also claimed the number of chronic water-logging spots in the city has gone down from 40 to 3 due to the civic body's ongoing efforts.
"Now we have only three chronic spots at Nair Hospital in Mumbai Central, Road number 24 in Sion and Hindmata in Parel, to which we have given utmost attention," Deshmukh said adding the administration is in the process of launching an android app to help identify water-logging spots.
The official alleged, "Local residents are dumping debris and garbage in the recently-desilted drainages and nallas, which can undo all our efforts."
In the wake of reports of alleged irregularities in reconstruction of roads and drainage desilting work, Deshmukh said, "We have made several changes in the tender documents to ensure effective cleaning and desilting.
