Most of the 40 trees that had fallen at 20-25 locations in the Capital have not been removed; civic officials blame staff shortage and lack of vehicles for the delay
Over 40 trees at 20-25 locations were reported to have been uprooted in the rain that lashed the national Capital on Sunday. The respective civic bodies, however, are yet to remove the debris, disrupting traffic movement on many key roads, including south Delhi's Mehrauli-Badarpur road, CR Park, Chirag Dilli flyover, Greater Kailash, Masjid Moth, CV Raman Marg, and central Delhi's Shershah Suri Marg.
The uprooted trees lying in the middle of the roads choked the peak-hour traffic, resulting in hours-long jams at most places on Monday.
According to officials of the three municipal corporations, a total of 21 trees in south Delhi, 11 in north, and 10 in east Delhi were uprooted on Sunday.
"We started receiving complaints regarding the trees on Sunday evening itself. While we had removed most of the broken logs by Monday morning, we are still in the process of removing others as some of our staffers are on a leave. Also, we are falling short of the number of vehicles required to carry these trees," a senior civic official said.
At least eight-nine medium and full-grown trees had fallen on the Shershah Suri Marg, blocking the flow of traffic.
Rajan N Pillai, who works at the Delhi High Court (HC), said: "The stretch was lined with uprooted trees, which covered half of the carriageway. I remained stuck for 15 minutes. The municipal corporations should have removed these trees early in the morning, if not on Sunday night, so that the peak-hour traffic was not disrupted."
In east Delhi's Patparganj, commuters faced the same hassle.
"There was major chaos because a large tree had fallen, covering almost the entire approach road. The Resident Welfare Association (RWA) members had called up the civic agency control room. No help, however, came till late in the evening. I reached my workplace in ITO around 20 minutes late because of the jam," Ashok Arora, a resident of IP Extension, said.
...& ANALYSIS
- The civic authorities fail to carry out the tree trimming exercise in advance
- Cleaning of drains and tree trimming should have been done by the respective civic bodies at the start of the month of May
DROP IN TEMPERATURE
- At 29.4 degrees Celsius, the city recorded the highest fall in maximum temperature in May in the last five years on Monday, IMD officials said. Pleasant wind and drizzle continued throughout the day, bringing the temperature 11 degrees below normal.
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