Dimapur citizens prepare for worst as civic sense goes down the drain

Our Reporter
Dimapur, Sep. 30 (EMN): As Nagaland prepares for the retreating monsoon, citizens of Dimapur are preparing for the worst, even though it may be a good respite from the summer heat.

Every year, during the monsoon in the commercial hub, many areas get submerged in water due to bad drainage causing clogging of water.

Speaking to Eastern Mirror, the officer on special duty (OSD) Nagaland State Disaster Management Authority (NSDMA), Johnny Ruangmei, said that the Urban Development department is planning on ‘fostering a new urbanisation restructure’ for Dimapur due to the reoccurrence of floods every year.

“There are a lot of low lying areas like Dhobinala, Burma Camp and others that are perennial areas; the drainages running from these areas lead to Dhansiri river but the drainages are lower than the Dhansiri level,” Ruangmei informed, adding that it was one of the main reasons that causes floods every year.

Ruangmei informed that if the drainages are not restructured, the NSDMA will have to respond to the impact of immediate rainfall till such a development happens.

“It is time to really look at the issues and address it as soon as possible,” he maintained.

He further informed that due to the pandemic, many projects for restructuring of the commercial hub had taken a backseat. “The drainages need to have a proper gradient, and realignment needs to be done,” he said.

“The chief minister had also called for a virtual meeting to address the monsoon preparedness with all concerned authorities and DCs for the upkeep of the roads, bridges and communities,” informed Ruangmei.

He said that Nagaland’s issue of having normal precipitation is ‘not much of a concern but the rainfall that occurs in a short frame of time that causes the flooding is what the problem is’.

An official from PWD also informed this newspaper that the water should drain out as soon as the water level subsides in the rivers but it get trapped in the colonies as there is no proper drainage system.

Another major hindrance, the official cited was that many landowners did not allow the department to construct drains that were in low areas, obstructing the flow of drainage from the upper areas.

“The main problem lies in people blocking the drain that takes the water to the bigger drains or the river; there is no outlet to let it flow to the river,” shared the official.

“You have a look along the Church Road to Holy Cross junction and you will see that people dump their wastes (papers, plastics, paper cup) into the drains from the small gaps of the coverts,” the official said.

‘We even suggested the (district) administration and Dimapur Municipal Council (DMC) to issue an order to all the shops to keep their front clean, provide dust bins and fine whoever is not keeping their vicinity clean but it never materialised,’ shared the official.

The official maintained that once drainages are properly built and restructured, it would also take the joint efforts of the public to keep the drains clean and follow civic sense so that further flooding can be avoided in the near future.