Police have asked the Kolkata Municipal Corporation to clear the sewer channels underneath several key thoroughfares in the city to ensure that traffic is not affected by waterlogging during the monsoon.

The police have listed roads that witness waterlogging with every heavy spell of rain.

The list include stretches of Mahatma Gandhi Road, Rabindra Sarani, Central Avenue, Mukta Ram Babu Street and Jyotindra Mohan Avenue in the north and Loudon Street, Rawdon Street, Congress Exhibition Road and New Park Street in the south.

The gully pits on some of these roads need cleaning and the sewer network must be kept ready so that waterlogging does not hit traffic movement.

The stretches of the Mahatma Gandhi Road in central Calcutta remained waterlogged for sometime on Monday morning when it rained.

Officials from the KMC’s drainage department turned up in the afternoon to unclog pits on the stretch during a low tide phase in the Hooghly river.

The department undertook the exercise to ensure rainwater flowed to the underground sewer channel through the pits so that traffic movement was not affected by waterlogging.

Senior officers of Kolkata Police said if the pit cleaning job is wrapped up early, the challenges of managing traffic would be less.

“We have asked the drainage and sewerage department officials of the KMC to see that rainwater gets drained quickly from some of the traditionally low-lying pockets throughout the city so that traffic is not held up in those stretches,” a senior police officer said.

“Our officers have called upon executive engineers of the drainage and sewerage wing in the boroughs to ensure the gully pits are cleaned. The work can be taken up during the lean traffic hours — either in the afternoon or at night. In some areas, the traffic is relatively less now because the schools are shut,” he added.

The drainage mechanism across parts of Rawdon and Lower Rawdon Street had come up for scrutiny when former Indian cricket captain Saurav Ganguly flagged concerns about waterlogging on Lower Rawdon Street two years back.

Ganguly, who owns a 23.6-cottah plot with a two-storey building on Lower Rawdon Street, wrote to Mayor Firhad Hakim, saying that “a good shower results in enormous waterlogging in the entire area.”

KMC officials said the underground pipes, drawing rainwater, were dilapidated in several areas known for waterlogging, even after a smart shower. Those have been replaced with new ones with a larger diameter.

“Some of these underground pipelines were damaged when the AJC Bose Road flyover was being built. After the repairs, the rainwater will drain into the main brick sewer, which lies beneath AJC Bose Road and carry it to the Palmer Bazar pumping station,” a civic body engineer said.

“Across the city, our teams have been clearing gully pits in the low-lying areas throughout the winter. This is a continuous process,” he said.

With showers expected for three days beginning Thursday in the city, senior officers said they have alerted all traffic guards to ensure that vehicular movement is not stuck because of waterlogging.

Efforts must be made to ensure the water is drained at the earliest so that the carriageways are free for traffic, the officers added.