The Chennai Catastrophe-Why did it happen?

Chennai has been struck by a disaster of such a massive scale for the first time since tsunami 2004. Thousands of people have been displaced from their homes and so many have lost their lives. Even the relatives of people in Chennai have been suffering from anxiety and nervousness as they aren't able to contact anybody in Chennai with the mobile network and the landline down for days. No electricity has further amplified problems for people marooned in their houses as they wouldn't be able to pump up water without it. The roads have been waterlogged even three days after the heavy spell of rains causing severe concerns over the outcome of an epidemic.

But a 100 year old record breaking North-East monsoon is only partially the cause. Consider this: In Chennai from October 1 till date, there has been 47 cm of rainfall while in New York City there's average rainfall of 57 cm during the rainy months, in London 43 cm, yet there's not much waterlogging and the roads are dry a few hours after the rains.

Chennai has 2 major rivers, the Adyar and the Couum rivers, a couple of major reservoirs - one in Chembarambakkam and one in Poondi , various lakes and the Buckingham canal. Due to unplanned and unchecked development, houses and colonies have been built on the flood plains and river embankments. The Buckingham canal's width has been reduced from 25 to 10 meters thanks to the Mass Rapid Transit System which also runs through the Pallikaranai Marshlands too, the IT sector built on low lying flood plains, so many colleges constructed in the path of rivers and lakes and hell, even the Airport is built on the Adyar rivers flood plains. The Pallikaranai marshland has literally become a place to dump garbage on. The drainage system is garbage and silt filled with no place for rain water to flow through.

All this is like a tumor slowly spreading waiting for the cancer to take over the individual, in this case   , a drowning city being dealt the sucker punch when the Chembarambakkam reservoir filled up and started to release 35000 cusecs of water which is HUGE. So basically, this was a man made disaster waiting to happen.

So much for Chennai being a 'smart city'!