BAHAWALPUR/MIANWALI: A downpour along with strong winds that lashed the city and suburbs on Sunday night, brought sufferings not only for the people of low-lying areas but also for residents of posh localities as water flowed into houses and shops.

It started raining on Saturday night and within minutes the roads and streets turned into streams as water made its way into houses after gutters overflowed.

The city’s busy intersections of Farid Gate, Fowara Chowk, main Circular Road, Satellite Town’s thoroughfares, streets and the kachi abadis of Model Town B and Baghdad colonies had turned into streams.

Houses, shops submerged

Knee-deep water had accumulated on the roads causing a great deal of inconvenience to motorists as a number of vehicles and motorcycles were stuck up.

The shopkeepers around Fowara Chowk and Circular Road were helplessly seeing rainwater damaging their articles.

The supply of electricity to residential colonies disrupted as well.

After the rain stopped, the city tehsil municipal administration (TMA) installed a number of pumping sets to drain out the rainwater from roads and localities.

According to Rescue 1122 and police, no loss of life was reported.

In Mianwali, torrential rains continued for second day, making life miserable.

The underpass which is the main entrance to the city, was submerged by rainwater.

Haroon Akmal Khan, owner of Badar Plaza situated near the underpass, told Dawn that water flowed into the basement and despite repeated calls to the district administration, the TMA failed to rescue them. He said rainwater had inflicted a heavy loss on him.

When contacted TMA Administrator Ghulam Mustafa said: “The staff is working round the clock to drain out water from the underpass but over 100 mm rain has rendered the team helpless. We are trying to make some breach to flush out water and the engineering staff is present at the underpass.”

Published in Dawn, August 3rd, 2015

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