By D N Singh   

The tragic death of a young boy in overflowing drains last Sunday, in Bhubaneswar once again shames us all as to how the civic system or its authorities live in an island of ignorance. Ignorance of few but impacts all-pervasive.

They mainly live in a hidebound state of complacency and none of the higher among them ever ventures out of the comforts of the offices for a reality check once in a while.

Which ostensibly shows that how their pattern of work depends on misinformation or understatement of the real situations.

It has not been the first case in recent times. Rains have to be there during the monsoon and preparedness should be in place to tackle the water logging-related problems.

In a similar incident, a boy was killed by drowning in a drain in 2018 and then an elderly woman was washed away by a street stormwater channel flooded in 2019.

It was all preceded by a very heartrending tragedy when Pupun Biswal who was a ninth class student, fell victim to an unguarded drain in Behera Sahi inside the capital city as his screams for rescue went down in the din of the rains.

Numerous such instances took place however, the incident of last Sunday in which a 15-year-old boy died has a reason to reopen the wounds of many.

According to some working on such a civic safety field, the capital city has a stretch of about 800 km of the drain which includes sub-drains and the increase in the poor or absolutely no maintenance of the drains kill people on whose tax such worthless and uncared for drains are built.

Do the civic authorities have even driven across the main drain running in the Patrapada area, gazing at the NH? It runs up to Tomando beginning from a little beyond Baramunda.

Which is a classic witness of being the clogged channel which has recently claimed over seven lives.

 It exposes a classic case of the grotesque state of affairs. After every 25 meters or so, a huge opening gapes at one as the maintenance lids lie away somewhere. Since many of the areas do not have sufficient street lighting, any pedestrian can be a victim falling inside the open ditch to death.

In the case of Cuttack, it can be understood as the city suffers from geographic contortion and remains like a cauldron. Where waterlogging can be imminent.

But Bhubaneswar is a peninsula of small hillocks, flattened with time, partially, for townships yet what bugs the city is the near-total absence of a self-regulated safety mechanism and advance preparedness to face the flooding rain waters in monsoon.

Talk to authority the answer is metamorphic “ the incident is unfortunate. The family has lost the child and we cannot give back the life” is the kind of alibi from the department.

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