Heavy pre-monsoon rain paralysed routine activities in the Punjab capital inundating different localities with rain water, which has exposed the tall claims of civic agencies of adopting foolproof arrangement for monsoon.
The thunderstorm rain that began in wee hours of Friday lasted till afternoon, although the intensity of rain decreased as the day progressed. The tall claims made by the civic agencies and Lahore City District Government washed out with the rain and much hyped new sewerage work in the city, which is still underway in many places, failed to drain the rain water that flooded the roads and streets knee high.
In fact, the city was flooded and all the routine activities were disturbed. Traffic on major roads was jam packed, moving at a snail pace. For a commuter, it took almost two hours to drive between Punjab Secretariat and Punjab Assembly Chowk, which otherwise was a 15-minute drive. Areas like Icchrra, Mozang, Shadman, Gulberg, Qaddafi Stadium, Laxami Chowk, Badami Bagh, Abid Market, Nisbat Road, McLeod Road, Chourburji, Islampura, Krishannagar Bazaar, Shadbagh, Railway Station, Misri Shah, Mughalpura Do Muriah Pul, Queen's Road and Cooper Road were inundated and the roads were submerged.
Vehicles, especially motorcycles, found a daunting task to drive on the flooded roads and many were stranded in the water. During visit to Children Hospital, it was found that rain water was being pumped out with motors, while the doors of hospital were also closed down.
Recently, sewerage work has been carried outside the Banking Court on The Mall to prevent accumulation of rain water, which was a common sight after every rain. However, despite laying of new drains pipes, which took months to complete and in the process creating traffic problems, it failed to drain the rain water on Friday that created traffic chaos. In some localities rain water entered the houses of inhabitants.
The government held a number of meetings to review the monsoon arrangements and showed satisfaction over the work, on which millions of rupees have been spent. Business activities were almost zero in the city and people without a choice could not carry out their normal activities. Many markets opened late and salaried people were late to the work. Every year, inefficiency of the civic agencies and the government causes the city economic loss of millions of rupees, in addition to the people's money that goes wasted on the so-called monsoon arrangements.
The people were discontentment over the whole situation and lambasted the civic agencies and the government for failing to adopt necessary arrangements for the rainy session. They also questioned the much hyped sewerage work in the city and monsoon arrangements.
They said that if proper monsoon rain arrives then under the circumstances the entire city would be flooded for many days. "Our situation would be no less than Balochistan, where its coastal areas were flooded during the cyclone," they added. The much chaos caused by the rain was not less than 72 mm that the city received, which was the third highest after Sialkot 98 mm and Sargodha 89 mm, disclosed the Meteorological Department Lahore.
They said that more scattered thunderstorm rain was expected in the city. The Maximum temperature recorded was 29 Celsius degrees and the minimum temperature was 24 Celsius degrees.
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