Gurgaon to Bangalore, metros drown in rain

Monsoon brings India’s urban centres to their knees as authorities watch

GURGAON/NEW DELHI/MUMBAI/ BANGALORE: Tens of thousands of people were left stranded for hours on Friday as heavy rainfall deluged three major Indian cities, triggering miles-long traffic snarls, frantic rescue operations and niggling questions about poor planning and compromised civic infrastructure.

The worst-hit was Delhi’s satellite town of Gurgaon, where thousands of cars were partially submerged and numerous stationary trucks clogged the arterial National Highway 8 from Delhi to Jaipur till the afternoon with most other roads waterlogged.

The nightmare began on Thursday after a heavy evening downpour left commuters strand- ed—manywithoutfuelandwater — on their way back home from Gurgaon till well past midnight. Manywereseenabandoningtheir cars and wading through kneedeep water. The crisis forced the local police to ask Delhi residents to skip office as the state government announced a two-day holiday for schools.

In Mumbai, heavy showers killed a 45-year-old man after a tree collapsed on his car as many parts of the city witnessed waterlogging and huge puddles, slowing down traffic to a trickle.

The frenzied scenes were mirrored down south in Bangalore, where rainfall over the past three days inundated most of the city as lakes breached their banks and people were seen fishing in the swirling waters.

VIJAYANAND GUPTA/HT Schoolchildren walk through a waterlogged street at Sion on Friday.