Rain led to waterlogging, resulting in snarls and slow vehicular movement across the city on Tuesday.
Kolkata’s notorious drainage and a high tide in the Hooghly are again to blame.
A police officer said there was waist-deep water in front of the fire brigade station beside Mohammad Ali Park for a long time. MG Road and Rabindra Sarani, too, were waterlogged.
A long stretch of Chittaranjan Avenue was also under water.
A man who travelled along Chittaranjan Avenue around 2.30pm said that he found the entire stretch between MG Road and Chandni Chowk waterlogged.
The officer said that a stretch of MG Road was waterlogged till evening.
Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) said that at least three parts of the city recorded 50mm or more rain within two hours — between noon and 2pm — on Tuesday.
Thanthania received 65mm of rain; Palmer bridge in Sealdah received 56mm of rain; Maniktala received 50mm of rain; Belgachia received 42mm of rain and Chingrighata received 35.5mm of rain during this period.
A KMC official reported “5 inch to 8 inch of water” on College Street, especially near College Street Bata; Keshab Chandra Sen Street and Muktaram Babu Street.
Tarak Singh, the mayoral council member in charge of the KMC’s drainage department, said the high volume of rain in a short span of time together with high tide in the rivers adjoining Kolkata prevented the water from being drained out into the rivers resulted in waterlogging for several hours.
“The sluice gates at the mouth of rivers Bidyadhari and Hooghly were closed between 2.30pm and 6.30pm because of high tide,” Singh said.
He added that Tuesday’s rain was primarily spread across north and central Kolkata.
South Kolkata received lesser rain in comparison.
“Sixty-five per cent of rainwater from the north and central Kolkata are drained out into the Bidyadhari river to Kolkata’s east. Because of high tide in the river, we could not open the sluice gates and the canals carrying Kolkata’s rainwater could not be drained out into the river at all between 2.30pm and 6.30pm,” he said.
According to Singh, the maximum volume of rain occurred between 12.30pm and 1.30pm on Tuesday.
“We got hardly an hour’s time to drain out the water after the intense rain stopped. This is one of the reasons for the waterlogging,” he said.
