SRINAGAR: The Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) has begun de-watering the submerged areas since early hours of morning and has pressed into the services both the mobile and stationed pumps across the city, particularly at the vulnerable points.
Following reports of water logging, Mayor Srinagar took a review meeting on dewatering progress in his office chamber after conducting extensive field visits at different working stations and areas under submergence to take stock of de-watering exercise that is going on constantly because of unprecedented showers.
He was accompanied by Deputy Mayor Shiekh Imran,Commissioner SMC Mr Khurshid Ahmad Sanai, SE Drainage, Exn Left River Works, Xen Right River Works, Exn Mechanical division, AEE's,Chief Sanitation Officer, Chief Transport Officer and other officials. Mr Mattu visited various places including Regal Chowk, Jehangir Chowk, Lalchowk, Magarmal bagh, Batamaloo Etc.
Mayor passed on directions to the concerned team to keep dewatering stations in full operational mode round the clock and keep the standby diesel/generator sets in a state of readiness at the permanent dewatering stations.
An action plan to divide the city into four deployment zones ie North, West, east and south and to set up a control room for deploying of dewatering pumps throughout the city was also drafted in the meeting so that people in case of facing submergence in the wake of wet forecast can directly contact the liaison officer of that particular zone.
Both men and machines are working on war footing to ensure no civilian faces any inconvenience due to the rain water. The officials apprised Mayor of the ground situation and the men and machinery in place to dewater inundated areas.
The SMC has in place 80 pumping stations and all the catchment areas will be drained off “There Will be no submergence where these pump stations are working. They function round the clock,” said commissioner SMC Mr Sanai.
Besides this SMC has put in place sucker machines, and 115 mobile pumping units and for the first time eight high capacity Auto Prime Trolly mounted pumping units have been installed in the city as well.
The SMC has prioritized areas and all those places where there are reports of submergence will be attended to. “Major areas facing water logging have already been attended to,” said Mr Sanai.