Rulers fiddle as City sinks

Rulers fiddle as City sinks
DH News Service, Bangalore:
Even as residents of the water-logged Sai Garden Apartments in Kadugodi remained trap-ped in a virtual island for the second consecutive day on Friday, the widespread rain damage across the City has had little impact on the ministers...


No minister came forward to enquire about the citizens’ problems, altho-ugh the City boasts of six representatives in the B S Yeddyurappa ministry: two of them in-charge of its upkeep and the chief minister himself holding the Bangalore development po-rtfolio.

Forget relief announcements, even a review meeting was not held at the Vidhana Soudha during the day.

Hundreds of houses and residential flats have been marooned in several low-lying areas of the City, following the heavy downpour over the last three days. While residents in Whitefield were rescued using boats, the rains have reduced the City roads to a rubble with huge craters pockmarking virtually every other stretch.

Yet, the ministers preferred remaining oblivious to the sorry state of affairs. While Katta Subramanya Naidu who is in charge of Bangalore South, was away in the US along with the chief minister, R Ashok who is the Bangalore North in-charge, Suresh Kumar, Arvind Limbavali, Shoba Karandlaje and Ramachandra Gowda were occupied with their own work.

Suresh Kumar though managed to find some time to inspect the ongoing underpass work at Malle-swaram Circle which was affected due to the rains. He had visited the rain affected are as in Rajajinagar on Thursday.

No meetings were held with any BBMP officials. Besides the half a dozen ministers, Bangalore has 10 Member of Legislative Council and two MPs.

Last year, Ashok, a minister in the then JD(S)-led coalition government, had monitored the situation sitting in the BBMP control room through a night when the City experienced a similar situation.

Dreams drowning

An apartment with a swimming pool is something people dream of while buying a flat but the residents of Sai Garden Apartments had never dreamt that they would be surrounded by a swimming pool.

Thanks to Wednesday’s heavy rains and the apathy of the BBMP, the apartment complex continued to look literally like an island on Friday.

Stranded in their houses even after two days of the heavy downpour, the residents only had canoes to link them physically to the rest of the world.

As the two canoes proved insufficient, people were left with no other option but to wait. The possible presence of snakes, scorpio and other poisonous insects deterred the potential bravehearts among the residents to swim across to fetch essentials.

Some residents who had come out of the apartment complex and hired a room or taken refuge in lodges, waited in vain for the waters to recede. All that the people prayed for was the intervention of the government to drain out the water.