Mumbai, (Samajweekly) Delayed by over a fortnight, monsoon finally hit Maharashtra with full fury, claiming at least six lives in the past 24 hours in the financial capital Mumbai.
The IMD has forecast heavy rains in Mumbai over the next 48 hours with an orange alert for Tuesday.
Several districts like Palghar, Thane, Raigad, Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg have also been issued rainfall warnings of varying alerts till June 30.
Late on Saturday, two contract workers fell into a manhole while cleaning up a rain-soaked road at Govandi in north-east Mumbai. They are identified as Ram Krishan, 30 and Sudhir Dhas, 35.
Early on Sunday morning, a senior couple Priscilla Misquitta, 65 and her husband Robi Misquitta, 70, were killed after a two-storied building crashed in Vile Parle gaothan area in the western suburbs.
Barely hours later, a tenement crashed in Ramabai Ambedkar Nagar in Ghatkopar east, trapping several persons of whom two were killed, and four others were injured.
They were identified as Alka Palande, 94 and her son Naresh Palande, 56, whose bodies were recovered from the debris on Monday morning.
The injured victims have been admitted to the Rajawadi Hospital where their condition was described as stable by the BMC Disaster Control on Monday.
A senior citizen, Vasumathi Nair, 75, fell and suffered minor injuries when floodwaters from the adjoining road seeped into their ground floor flat in Badal Society, Bhandup west – ironically, after the BMC carried out road repairs to prevent water seepage, said her daughter Mini P. Menon.
Heavy rains or showers continued to lash Mumbai and the coastal Konkan region all through Monday, though there was no major disruption of rail, road or air traffic.
Waterlogging was reported from some areas in the city and suburbs including water seeping into ground floor homes, some low-lying roads and subways, putting people on alert.
State Congress President Nana Patole slammed the BMC for the flooding reported in different parts of the city in the very first rains and demanded to know “where the crores of rupees spent on cleaning drains/gutters have gone”.
