M Rafi Ahmed
It’s the same old story in Coimbatore with rainwater getting stagnated under Avinashi road flyover, Kikani school underpass and Somasundaram Mill subway. The rains that lashed the city and suburbs in the early hours of this morning played spoilsport putting the commuters in a tight spot. This has been the case right from the 80s when there was heavy downpour inundating the main thoroughfare more so the flyover underpass.
District Collectors come and go, but the problem remains forever without any permanent solution to stagnation of rainwater. It has become a ritual for top honchos to visit the spot to oversee the work on pumping of water from under the flyover and underpass. Longtime residents of the city, who witnessed the construction of the Avinashi road flyover way back in 1974 during Kalaignar’s regime when Ujjal Singh was the Tamil Nadu Governor, said that the absence of proper planning is the reason for the sorry state of affairs.
Octogenarian retired postmaster Kovaipudur N Hariharan recalls the idea conceived by the then district collectors like K H Moinuddin and Bhujanga Rao getting the engineering students from reputed institution in Coimbatore to come out with tangible project to ensure stagnated rainwater recedes under the Avinashi road flyover and the underpass located along the rail route. The proposal sent to the Tamil Nadu government for approval was left to gather dust.
Had that project been implemented then, Coimbatore city wouldn’t have faced such water stagnation consistently even for a short spell, Hariharan said and added that constructive action is the need of the hour instead of temporary measure. “In my service as and postmaster and public relations inspector in the Department of Posts, I am witnessing rain water stagnation whenever there are heavy rains.
Meanwhile, Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (JIH) secretary A Abdul Hakkim suggested that a contest must be conducted for engineering college students including the IIT inviting innovative projects for draining the rainwater that gets stagnated under the Avinashi road flyover and other subways in the city. This would make the students to think out-of-the-box to work in unison to come out with some permanent solution to the water stagnation.
In this connection, the former Coimbatore Corporation Commissioner M Prathap is reported to have said that the city corporation has decided to rope in Anna University experts to solve waterlogging at the subways after conducting a detailed study of the Lanka corner underway, Kikani school subway and Avinashi road flyover. Following his transfer, the idea mooted by has been swept under the carpet.
There is no meaning in visiting the spot after the water stagnation. As to the adage—Prevention is better than cure, the district administration must think in terms of a permanent solution by utilising engineering students through a contest so that divergent views and ideas will pour in for the collector and the corporation commissioner to select the best one from among the contestants.
