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Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike goes corporate to keepunderpasses from flooding this timeBangalore Mirror Bureau | Jun 11, 2018, 04.00 AM IST

carBy Manoj Sharma Palike is urging big firms nearby to buy and house pumps under CSR initiative to draw out water from underpasses as and when requirde Clogging of underpasses has been as big a problem for commuters as for the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), which draws flak every rainyseason for letting it happen, yet again. Take, for example, the Le Meridien underpass in Vasanthanagar. When the BBMP installed a pump there to drawout the water during heavy rainfall, someone stole it. Equipment worth lakhs gone in a flash (flood). After a decade of failures, the BBMP decided to lookfor sponsors who could install these pumps within their property, and also manage and maintain them. Recently, with the Le Meridien underpass in mind, the BBMP wrote to complexes nearby, seeking a sponsor under the Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR). According to BBMP’s Chief Engineer (East) Prasad BS, Prestige Group and Nitesh Hotel managements agreed to install the pumps inside theirpremises. “Each unit of the water pump costs Rs 8 lakh, including a 60-metre water pipeline. The pumps would be installed within a week,” he said. Buoyed by this success, the civic agency now plans to do this in other parts of the city too. The letter that the BBMP wrote said: “When the underpass was constructed, the BBMP had installed water pumps to collect and convey the excesswater… to avoid water-logging in the underpass... However, since the pumps were kept in an unsecured area, they were subsequently stolen and,presently, the water-logging in the said underpass is being cleared with portable pumps and hose, which are deployed during rains.” With the aim to set up “an independent water pumping system”, the letter requested buildings nearby “to take this work up under your CSR initiative andprovide two numbers of 10 HP or larger capacity pumps… housed inside your premises with pipeline to collect and discharge water from the Le Meridienunderpass. Also appoint a person to ensure switching on of the pumps during rain… and also bear the electricity bills,” the letter read.

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BM Vijay Shankar, Special Commissioner (Projects), BBMP told BM that also the Le Meridien underpass gets flooded during rains and motorists areforced to take alternative routes, “we did not install pumps fearing they would be stolen again. And, so, we wrote to building owners in the area to buy thepumps with their CSR funds. We plan to do this in other parts of the city too,” he said. Nayeem Noor, Executive Director, Prestige Group, said: “We will be installing the water pump and we will keep the motor pumps within our premises.We are doing it as the underpass had always been flooded during heavy rains. With this activity, we want to ensure better commute for motorists in thisparticular place.”

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Ones that routinely get flooded * Meridien underpass * Kino Theatre underpass * Nehru Circle underpass * Yelahanka underpass