Walking on Mumbai’s waterlogged roads during the monsoon has become a life-threatening ordeal. Last week, during the Mayor’s inspection, a municipal officer fell into an open drain. That incident should have prompted immediate action to secure all open drains and manholes. Instead, administrative negligence has now claimed another life after a person fell into an open manhole.
What makes this more alarming is that the delayed monsoon gave the civic administration the whole of June to prepare. Yet, fatal lapses continue, raising a serious question: are the lives of Mumbai’s citizens being treated with the urgency and value they deserve?
A contempt petition over open manholes and potholes in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region is now before the court. At Monday’s hearing, the civic body claimed that protective grills had been installed on 71,426 of 73,437 manholes, while 2,011 were permanently shut. The court, however, made it clear that statistics alone are meaningless and asked whether the corporation could guarantee that no citizen would die due to an open manhole.
That remains the real test of governance.
