Residents left high and dry

Vittal Mallya Road is touted to be one of the best roads in the City. However, come rain and one can see the concrete stretch submerged in sewage water. Commuters passing the junction have to waddle through the dirty water near the Coffee Day circle on Lavelle Road while the residents have to struggle to keep their houses, especially basements, clear.

Water-logging been a woe for the residents of the area for years now and this is more so during the rains. The rapid development and concretisation of the area has resulted in the nuisance according to the people who have been living here for decades.

Dilip D’Souza, a businessman who lives in D’Souza Layout opposite UB City, had to shell out a huge sum of money last year when his basement got flooded during the rains. “I had to pay Rs 15,000 to the fire department to pump out the water. My meter got damaged as well,” he laments.

“The problem is that a part of the Raja Kaluve, the stormwater drain, has been covered up. So when a large volume of water comes from areas like Lavelle Road, St Mark’s Road and even Kasturba Road, there is no place for it to go. My basement has been flooded three times in the past and whenever it rains, I go to the basement to check whether any water has seeped in. Now, I have put gates to block the water from coming in,” he adds.

The area boasts of some of the best restaurants and is one of the most happening places during the evenings. So when it rains, the business of these places gets affected too.

Says Payal Shah, the director of Bootlegger, a happening pub in the area, “We face a problem especially during the closing hours because we have the valet parking facility and the drivers can’t get the cars of the customers to the entrance of the restaurant due to water-logging. And how can the guests walk to their cars in such a situation?” 

Her business partner Shreyas faced a huge problem when the extra water seeped into his car a few weeks ago. “There was one-and-a-half feet of water that day and since the air intake of the car is at the bottom, the water got sucked into the engine,” he says.

“I remember that day, there were 15 cars stuck on the road and generally when there is a heavy rain, the road is flooded for at least half an hour. One can’t walk through it as it’s all dirty drain water,” he adds. And of course when there is water-logging, the traffic manifolds too. Natasha Samyuk, who works in Cafe Coffee Day, travels between Benson Town and Coffee Day Square building.

 “I pass this area everyday and the traffic becomes really bad in the evenings especially when it rains. It’s understandable as there are places like UB City, Cubbon Park and JW Marriott around. There is a lot of water-logging in the area and the road near Cafe Coffee Day, Lavelle Road is wet most of the times. There is a small drainage with a grill there and vehicles go over that often. But they can collapse any minute and it could be very dangerous for the people who are walking by too,” she sums up.