Sion (W)

MUMBAI: It has been barely one month since monsoon arrived in the city and the BMC has already flushed out as much as 37,000 million litres of runoff rainwater into the sea. The capacity of Tulsi and Vihar lakes together is almost equivalent to the amount of water that has been released into the sea, said officials. The full capacity of Vihar lake is 28 million litres while Tulsi’s is 8 million litres.

The huge amount of runoff is a result of the city’s increasing concretized surface, which doesn’t allow rainwater to get absorbed into the ground.

The BMC has put in place a policy under which buildings on larger plots are entitled to occupation certificates only if they set up a rainwater harvesting mechanism. However, the policy remains only on paper and is barely implemented.

“The runoff was flushed out by de-watering pumps and pumping stations at Irlah, Britannia, Cleaveland, Lovegrove,” said an official.

On Monday, 142 of the total 298 de-watering pumps which help tackle localized water-logging were in operation. “It has clearly rained more in the city than in catchment areas. Tulsi and Vihar are located in the city limits and hence, they are almost full,” said the official.

