Agitation forces minister to visit waterlogged areas

Eight teams formed to identify encroachments made across waterways: Geetha Jeevan

The encroachments all along the waterways of the town will be identified with the help of maps and removed to ensure immediate draining of rainwater stagnating at several places, Minister for Social Welfare P. Geetha Jeevan has said.

Rainwater stagnation makes residents to spend sleepless nights as the sewage has mixed with the stagnant water and seeped into to the drinking water pipes through cracks since mid-November. Though the corporation has deployed around 400 pumps across the town to pump out stagnant sewage and rainwater, the result is not impressive as this effort has miserably failed to solve the problem.

The prime reason behind this issue is the non-cooperation of the lower-level corporation staff, who do not operate the pumps round-the-clock to pump out the sewage-mixed rainwater. While the pumps deployed on the arterial and other important roads are properly operated to escape from the wrath of the higher-ups and the public, the motors kept at interior areas housing middle-class families are kept idle after operating them for a couple of hours.