Ranchi: Only 32mm rain in the past 24 hours has inundated Yamunanagar, home to more than 4,000 people. And no, it is not some remote hamlet, but an urban neighbourhood tucked between posh Harmu and Ratu Road in Ward 34.
Even the briefest bouts of rain are enough to maroon residents here, courtesy lack of a drainage system. While people blame the municipal corporation for letting them grapple with this annual agony, the RMC says it is helpless because residents are not willing to part with land required for a drain network.
Little before noon on Friday, Tara Devi had a close shave when a portion of her semi-pucca, two-room house collapsed amid heavy waterlogging.
"Fortunately, we were in the other portion of the house. But, household items are buried in the rubble. The bed is broken," the woman in her mid-forties told this newspaper and turned to her daughter-in-law Pinni with the refrain, " Sab khatam ho gaya (Everything is lost)."
Sexagenarian Jagdishwar Chaurasiya was spotted wading through shin bone-deep water and said he was going to buy a mosquito coil.
" Saanp-bichchu bhi ghumte rehte hai sab jagah (Besides mosquitoes, there are snakes and scorpions too everywhere)," he said, adding that after every bout of rain, the area remained flooded for a few days and they needed to make arrangements till things normalised.
Sanjay Kumar, who owns a spice store in Yamunanagar, said leaving their homes was not an option and hence, they had to live with this annual curse.
" Naraknagar hai yeh poora (This place is like hell)," he said, underscoring that even those who had the means to relocate elsewhere had no way of selling their property in Yamunanagar. "There are no buyers for land or houses here. The situation is only worsening with each passing year. The authorities couldn't care less," Kumar added.
Ward councillor Vinod Kumar Singh said there was nothing that could be done unless the government took a policy decision to first identify all areas without proper drainage and then roll out plan to create civic assets by timely land acquisition either through mutual consent of residents or otherwise.
"I had consulted the RMC's engineering division to explore options for stopgap relief. The engineers are helpless unless land is available for drain construction. No one in Yamunanagar is ready to part with land," Singh said.
The councillor pointed out that haphazard construction over the years had become the biggest bane of the neighbourhood, which was under Ward 37 before delimitation. "Everyone was busy building houses then. No one thought twice before blocking drains."
Singh claimed that he had initiated a 1,200ft-long drain project earlier this year with Rs 10 lakh from the MLA local area development fund for temporary relief, but the plan suffered an unexpected blow.
"The contractor caught typhoid and was bedridden for a month. By the time he recovered, the rains started. After monsoon, we will try to resume the project if we can. As of now, I have given residents 10kg bleaching powder to deal with the vector menace," he added.
