An eight-year-old boy drowned in an unprotected CMC trench at the Tallah pumping station on Thursday.

Subham Pandey, a Class II student, was playing with his friends in an inundated field in the pumping station complex. The trench, dug for laying a pipe between Tallah and Palta, was also filled with water following heavy rain in the morning.

Unaware of the presence of the trench, Subham fell into it and drowned.

An executive engineer of the civic body said the trench had been barricaded but some children from a nearby slum had shifted a part of the fence to get in.

“The parents of the child will be given compensation. The amount of compensation will be decided by the mayor,” said municipal commissioner Arnab Roy.

Subham’s was the only rain death in the city on Thursday but Tallah was not the only pocket flooded.

With the city being lashed by around 60mm of rain between Wednesday evening and Thursday morning, several areas remained under water for long.

The lanes and bylanes on either side of Central Avenue were under water, at places knee-deep, forcing shopkeepers to down shutters.

In Behala, several pumps were operated to drain out rainwater from areas like Silpara, KK Roy Road and Sabarnapara as well as parts of Diamond Harbour Road.

“The water now recedes in two to three days, thanks to the pumps. Earlier it used to take more time,” said Shibaji Chatterjee, a Silpara resident.