New Delhi: A large number of houses were inundated in Hulimavu in Bangalore as water from a lake flooded the area on Sunday after its bund was damaged.
According to the Times of India, more than 1,000 families in half a dozen neighbourhoods were affected by the sudden flooding and 300 cars have been submerged.
City mayor M. Gautham Kumar said the incident occurred when some people allegedly tried to lay a pipe with the help of an earthmover, and the civic body Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBPM) would investigate further.
Times of India reported that a contractor had undertaken this work without proper permission from the BBPM, which has been the custodian of the Hulimavu lake since 2016.
“I was told a contractor had taken up development activities around the lake over the past two days and had tried to drain it by making a small hole in the bund. The contractor had said he would place sandbags so that the water would not enter residential areas and flow towards storm drain. However, he disappeared after the breach,” Arekere corporator Bhagyalakshmi Murali told the newspaper.
BBPM officials said fire and emergency services personnel were carrying out relief work. Pumps were deployed to flush the water out of basements of residential complexes, while efforts were on by engineers in the civic body to plug the breach, officials said. Affected families have reportedly been moved to three rehabilitation centres.
Raj Bhagat Palanichamy, who works as a GIS and remote sensing analyst at World Resources Institute, tweeted satellite animations to show that unplanned urbanisation have adversely affected flood plains across Bangalore.
Satellite image animation shows d destruction of flood plains in Gottigere –#Hulimavu– Madiwala valley due to unplanned urbanization
Now there’s no space to hold water during floods n no space for percolation either
Today when Hulimavu lake breached it’s flooding neighbourhoods pic.twitter.com/6KyhDmPcsb
— Raj Bhagat Palanichamy (@rajbhagatt) November 24, 2019
He urged authorities to take flood plain conservation more seriously, to avoid further such incidents.
#Map shows the location where Hulimavu lake breached.
Protecting flood plains is the need of the hour! Fixed buffers around waterbodies don’t help. Scientific mapping of our flood plains are required. pic.twitter.com/kA1SkNQB6z
— Raj Bhagat Palanichamy (@rajbhagatt) November 24, 2019