Misery rains down on Kochi residents for second day running

Heavy rain floods city for second day, disrupting traffic and inundating low-lying areas, throwing life out of gear.

Heavy rain lashed the city for the second consecutive day inundating houses and roads in low-lying areas, disrupting traffic and throwing life completely out of gear on Wednesday.

Though the residents had painstakingly cleaned up their houses flooded in the previous day’s cloudburst-triggered heavy downpour, a seemingly similar intense spell lashed the city around 3.30 p.m. on Wednesday. It was back to square one for those who were hit in Tuesday’s rain as water started inundating the cleaned-up houses.

It rained misery for the 100-odd households of Moolepadam in Ward 6 of the Kalamassery municipality for the second day running as water began to rise alarmingly. “The situation has turned as bad as it was the previous day with houses getting flooded. We are about to deploy rubber dinghy of the Fire and Rescue Services department for the evacuation of the worst affected,” said Nasheeda Salam, ward councillor.

The Infopark campus and the roads leading up to the park were flooded shortly after the rain started. “If this is the way things are, what plan do the District Disaster Management Authority and the Infopark authorities have for the coming days of heavy monsoon,” asked Hariram M.V., founder of Kochi Can’t Breathe, a collective of IT employees of Infopark formed during the Brahmapuram fire last year.

Thirty-odd houses in Shanthipuram Colony, another area that routinely gets inundated, in the Karanakodam division had water rise up to knee high. By that time, though, the residents had moved their valuables to a height having once suffered extensive damage a few years ago. “Arrangements have been made for opening a camp at St. Rita’s High School at Ponnurunni at short notice. However, they have chosen to stay back confident that water will drain out once the rain stopped,” said division councillor George Nanat.

Edappally was severely flooded, which has become a norm this season, and traffic through the national highway stretch between Vyttila and Edappally was brought to a grinding halt. Motorists were stranded on the stretch for hours together.

Palarivattom Junction was also submerged unlike on Tuesday resulting in a traffic nightmare. “I lost the key of my scooter parked here in the morning and had been trying to hire a cab or an autorickshaw for the past two hours. But everyone turned down the ride citing flooded roads. What will be the fate of people who do not own vehicles and face an emergency while stranded in such situations,” wondered Sriram J.K., an IT employee who got stranded at Palarivattom.