Slums reel under annual monsoon drill

MUMBAI, MAY 30: P Bhaskaran pauses as he looks skywards. He has a spade in his hand, wet with cement. The gamela is almost dry, it needs ...

MUMBAI, MAY 30: P Bhaskaran pauses as he looks skywards. He has a spade in his hand, wet with cement. The gamela is almost dry, it needs more water. The stairs to his room are almost complete. At two feet from the ground, he hopes they will keep the rainwater at bay. If not, he will just have make a dash for the highway, early morning or at the dead of night, in the driving rain along with his kids.

It8217;s a familiar picture in any slumsite in Mumbai today. At Appapada, in Prabhat Nagar, in Bhagatsingh Nagar in Indira Gandhinagar8230; slumdwellers are busy with the monsoon drill. It is that time of the year when the city8217;s most attractive feature becomes their bane. Lakhs of people who left their villages and drought-prone towns to eke out a living in the city of water and livelihood, are preparing to do the annual raindance. When nights are spent keeping vigil on seeping water, where school books and bags are kept on cupboards so that the kids don8217;t wake up to find them soaked the next morning, when toiletscannot be used because they are flowing on to the streets and when a simple electric switch could kill you.

And it is the same story of civic apathy, municipal neglect and absent city planning that makes the monsoon that much more trying for residents. If the BMC has built a four-foot drain in the vicinity, the effort is nullified by the hundreds of 10 ft x 10 ft rooms standing cheek-by-jowl alongside the drain, choking it with garbage. Says Surinder Singh at Prabhat Nagar in Malad E, 8220;Was the BMC keen on cleaning the nullah here, the water would not overflow into our houses.8221; A continuous downpour for even two hours ensures that water stands at his doorstep at chest-level. Kids have to be saved first, lest they be carried away by the tide.

8220;Whenever there is a downpour, the first thing we do is collect the kids and keep them in an attic of a two-storey house,8221; says Prakash Singh, an autodriver who lives here. Two-storey houses are not too many. Though the civic authorities have now agreed to allowthe construction of houses up to 14 feet, the bribery involved does discourage a few from doing so. 8220;We keep awake every night when there is a downpour, then somebody will shout, pani aa raha hain8217;, and we wake up,8221; says Malati Singh. The nearest dry outpost is the Eastern Express Highway, a good 15 minutes if you run fast.

Residents here recall the night in 1992, when a buffalo had got trapped in the drain and their houses were flooded for hours together. With four stables surrounding their homes, they pray the cattle will steer clear this year. 8220;And the foul smell remains in the house for days together,8221; complains Malati. 8220;If you go to the local corporators, all they do is survey the area and walk away,8221; says Rekha Khanolkar, who works with Nirbhayata, a non-governmental organisation.

8220;It will not help much,8221; says Bhaskaran at Ramprasad Chawl, Shivaji Nagar, as he slaps on the last spadeful of cement on his stairs. 8220;Water climbs at least four feet when the drain overflows, this will not stopit. But it will at least keep the water out when there is no downpour,8221; he sighs. In other places, doors are being walled up to two feet.

The houses built on reclaimed ground give way when the tiles are pushed out by the swelling pressure. Bhaskaran8217;s neighbour Parvati describes how she clutches her two kids and runs to the Appapada Road. 8220;Books are tied and kept on the cupboards so that they remain dry8230; On such days, all we can give our children is biscuits. Not even tea,8221; she says.

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Once the floor is taken care of, attention turns to the roof. Asbestos sheets are refitted. An 8 ft x 8 ft sheet costs Rs 400. And one sheet is not enough to keep out the rain. You need at least two. A brick wall that Indira in Bangurnagar has just completed costs Rs 1,000. The cob on her doorstep, Rs 500. Still, the monsoon will be particularly painful for Indira since hers is one of the six families rehabilitated on a drain. The BMC says it has closed the drain, but Indira is not so sure. At Bhagatsingh Nagar,residents are gearing up for a squishy ride to the toilets. 8220;We stop wearing slippers because it is worse with them on,8221; says Pallavi Parkar.

But going barefoot presents a greater danger. The cable connection to the electrical lines run underground. When the rain descends, the ground begins to emit electrical shocks. So, electric meters are shut off. And that leads to other problems. But when the monsoon itself is a calamity, can one afford to be choosy?