Taking their job seriously

BANGALORE: Bangaloreans by now are probably well versed with the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike’s ways of working. The constant complaining, the delays in taking appropriate action, missing deadlines, ignoring the resident’s plea and sometimes all together neglecting the matter.However, this time the Palike officials outdid themselves by taking prompt action. City Express had published a report on August 11, ‘Only half-hearted work done by BBMP’ stating the consequences of the desilting work that had been taken up in Sarvagnanagar a while ago.Less than a fortnight ago the Palike had desilted and cleared the storm water drain in the area to avoid any blocks in the flow of the water. But, the silt collected from the drain, was recklessly dumped along the road. This had caused inconvenience to the commuters and the pedestrians in the area. To add to their woes, the silt emanated a foul stench in the area and also occupied a few feet of the road.Pradeep Menon a resident of the area said, “It was such a relief to see the area cleared of all the muck. While it was there, the entire stretch used to stink. We used to literally cover our noses while walking past the waste that had been dumped. Thankfully the area was cleared soon enough without delay. It is nice to see the BBMP take such quick action.”Another resident of the area, Lakshmi said that while the filth was left there, pedestrian and the street vendors would walk on the other side of the road to avoid the stench.  ‘‘That caused chaos on one side of the road. Now that the area has been cleared, it would be nice if we could be provided with a footpath here as well,” she said.When contacted, the local corporator of the area, G Bhuvaneshwari had said that she would ensure that the area is cleared as soon as possible and would also look into the matter of proper garbage disposal. Most drains in the city are overflowing due to the excess water that the daily spells leave behind. The only way to avoid the overspill is to ensure that the drains are cleared of all the silt and garbage. The BBMP  executive engineer for the area, Jayshankar Reddy said that 60 per cent of the drain silting work had been completed in the area. ‘‘Forty per cent of the drains in the area are yet to be cleared,’’ he informed. The desilting work began almost a month ago. ‘‘Of the estimated 26,000 cubic metres of silt, 15,000 to 20,000 cubic metres have already been removed and transported to Hennur Bande quarry,” he revealed.According to the engineer, most of the major drains have been cleared only a few small ones are left. ‘‘The machine desilting is done (for drains over six feet wide), desilting  the smaller drains (less than six feet wide) that requires manual cleaning still remains,” he said.