A 32-storey skyscraper in Mumbai was feared to be at risk after a parking lot and driveway caved in while at least seven people were killed as heavy rains clobbered the city and large parts of coastal Maharashtra, officials said yesterday.
Around a dozen cars were trapped and damaged after a parking enclosure of the upscale Lloyds Estate in Wadala caved in early yesterday, leaving a yawning crater of around 20-30ft across.
The disaster occurred allegedly due to ongoing construction of a 40-storey building for which the plinth work was underway and a cement mixer’s sludge had choked up the locals drains.
As a precautionary measure, police and disaster officials evacuated nearly 270 families from the C and D towers of Lloyds Estate while efforts were on to verify whether anybody was trapped in the caved-in areas.
While the Antop Hill police station lodged a case against the officials of Dosti Realty, Mumbai Congress president Sanjay Nirupam, who rushed to the site, termed the development “as shocking and playing with the lives of innocent citizens”.
Overnight heavy rains hit rail and road traffic in Mumbai and other coastal areas. Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray compared yesterday’s downpour to the kind seen in Meghalaya’s Cherrapunji.
Belying the claims of the BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), waterlogging was experienced in several parts of the city and suburbs like Sion, Kurla, Matunga, Kings Circles, Dadar, Malad, Dahisar and Jogeshwari.
In the past 24 hours, Mumbai, Palghar, Thane, Raigad, Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg districts received an average of around 300mm rainfall, with many schools in these areas declaring a holiday to avoid inconveniencing students.
On the Western Railway (WR), a portion of the train tracks was washed out in Vapi division, but the situation was brought under control and traffic resumed with speed restrictions later in the morning.
The Central Railway suburban train services were disrupted due to waterlogging on the tracks at Thane, Sion, Kurla and other places, while WR local services were delayed due to a technical snag in Bandra.
On the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Highway, there was heavy waterlogging at several points in Mumbai and in Thane and Palghar districts as torrential rains lashed these areas and flood waters blocked the traffic between Maharashtra and Gujarat for several hours.
Waterlogging, minor landslides and cave-ins were reported at certain places on the Mumbai-Goa Highway which traverses through an entire coastal route, hitting traffic and causing snarls.
However, flights at Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport operated normally with no reports of any major disruptions.