Bright spots in rainy night

August 24: The target of water balloons as they trudged through knee-deep slush, eve-teasing, being refused lifts, trying to desperately ca...

August 24: The target of water balloons as they trudged through knee-deep slush, eve-teasing, being refused lifts, trying to desperately call home on a telephone that had stopped working

For every one of these unpleasant experiences that Mumbai’s harried commuters lived through on Friday night, there were more humane ones where ordinary Mumbaiites rose above their infamous cynicism and offered their invaluable services to ease the commuters’ ordeal.

On either side of Grant Road station, the water level had risen to a point where vehicles parked on the road were submerged. The only way out was to walk towards Mumbai Central: on the flooded tracks. As if on a pilgrimage, a row of over 200 people groped in the dark, slipping over stones, braving creepy-crawlies.

Story continues below this ad

They would have continued to slip, sink and lose their lives had it not been for the residents of the Sankalp Sidhhi society, adjacent to the tracks near Mumbai Central. Using makeshift wiring, hallogen lamps had been put up in four houses on the second floor. From 5 to 10 pm, over 20 young men from the society diverted the crowd towards the road, forming human chains.Under the direction of Daji Satam, their secretary, they created steps out of wooden benches, bought for the Ganesh festival celebrations. Two men physically lifted each person and placed them on the road, swamped by waist-deep water. As each harried person emerged on the Mumbai Central bridge, he could hear the sound of bhajans coming from the society’s Hanuman Mandir!

Somewhere else in the city, a frantic Neeta Konnure, a Chembur resident, waited for her eight-ear-old daughter Trishala, who reached home at 1 am on Saturday morning. She had been stranded in her school bus at King’s Circle. That is when Matunga resident Girish Dedhiya swung into action. He offered his mobile phone to the school-children and passengers of other stranded buses. Even after the phone stopped working, as most did due to over-loading, he collected chits with the names and numbers of each child.His wife Bhavana then called over around 100 parents, reassuring them of their children’s safety. Along with their neighbour Darshana Thakkar, she also offered the children water, tea, biscuits and snacks.Shiv Sainiks in their saffron head gear were also seen offering water and moral support to people stranded in vehicles along the highway. The Narayan Shyamjiwadi Jain Hall in Matunga gave shelter to atleast 1,000 people that night. Men and women were housed in different sections, and they were given tea and laddus.