GHMC prepares to meet monsoon contingencies

Hyderabad: As the monsoon announces its arrival in the city with spells of showers, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) prepares to meet contingencies arising during the rains. To ensure the low lying areas in the city are not inundated and roads are not waterlogged during downpour, the civic body has taken up a series of measures. Desilting of storm water drains, strengthening the storm water drain network, formation of monsoon emergency teams, construction of box drains, building and maintaining injection borewells are some of them.

To ensure participation from elected representatives, from now on photos of nala desilting will be shared with them post geo-mapping of coordinates. As of now, 24 excavators and 30 earth movers are desilting nalas in different parts of the city, and works pertaining to widening of storm water drains and construction of box drains are also underway. While the infrastructure is being developed to drain out water, the civic body also formed monsoon emergency teams.

These teams will be pressed into service during rains, and their job is to make sure the water is drained out at the earliest. Removing tree branches, tangled wires and addressing SOS calls are the other duties that the teams would be discharging. This year, 334 monsoon emergency teams will be deployed that include 139 static labour teams, 128 mini-mobile teams while 67 teams will be equipped with bigger vehicles and other required paraphernalia.

While the static teams will be deployed at strategic locations, the mini-mobile teams will move around the city attending complaints. All these teams will be equipped with vehicles, crowbars, tree cutters, water pumps and equipment required to pump out the water. GHMC’s disaster management force will also be deployed during downpour apart from the monsoon teams.

also held a meeting recently with officials of GHMC, Strategic Nala Development Plan (SNDP) and corporators of LB Constituency. GHMC LB Nagar zonal commissioner Upender Reddy said that around 95 per cent of desilting works have been completed in the zone, and works pertaining to repair of sluice gates near water bodies has been taken up with Rs 1.4 crore. As LB Nagar zone was one of the most affected areas when flood lashed the city last year, the meeting was held with the stake holders of that zone.