On July 8th, rains lashed Mumbai, disrupting regular life and causing waterlogging and floods in low-lying areas and on important routes. Central Railway officials mention that almost 900 train services were cancelled leaving several commuters stranded, while many BEST buses were diverted. Since then several incidents of heavy rains and flooding have been reported in the city.
Commuters, civic activists and residents have questioned the claims made by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) about being prepared for the monsoons.
“The half-constructed, newly-built DP road number 9 in Chandivali was waterlogged, which caused inconvenience to commuters,” said Mandeep Singh Makkar, founder of Chandivali Citizens Welfare Association. “We also received reports of open manholes on the road which could be life-threatening for passersby”.
“A new road should have drains built on either side of the road. Since one side of the road has been constructed, we assume that the drains have been built on that side. We fail to understand how despite the new drain, the road was waterlogged, ” said Mandeep.
He recalled that the BMC had invested in pumps to drain out stormwater but he’s unsure if they were helpful during the waterlogging events of July 8th. He added that some tree-falling incidents occurred in the area. While the apartments and high-rises in plush Chandivali were spared, chawls and slums saw water entering homes, noted Singh.
This highlights how climate events exacerbate disparity.
The disparity echoed in Govandi where certain low-lying areas were flooded. “Since the last 15 years, low-lying areas such as Baiganwadi and Rafique Nagar have seen waterlogging every time it rains heavily,” said Shaikh Faiyaz Alam, president of Govandi New Sangam Welfare Society. “Some informal settlements in the area were inundated due to the absence of drains.”
The Mankhurd subway, a critical traffic route, was underwater and was closed to vehicles. The BMC has not installed pumps in the area yet and repeated appeals to the BMC see no action. The disruption of public transport affected small businesses and daily wage workers, Alam told Citizen Matters. He also highlighted how the BMC cited a lack of finances as a reason for the delay in repair of stormwater drains.
MCAP, urban floods and climate budget
In 2022, the BMC released the Mumbai Climate Action Plan ( MCAP) that envisions a ‘climate-resilient city in the context of a changing and uncertain climate’.
The MCAP lists urban flooding and coastal risks as two of the five climate risks in Mumbai. Coastal risks are associated with coastal areas being exposed to the risk of property damage, loss of life and environmental degradation.
Using data from the disaster management department in the BMC, the MCAP identifies flooding “hotspots” in the city, where waterlogging and flood incidents are common. According to the MCAP, Wards F-north, H-east, H-west, K-west, L and M-west have over 40 hotspots each. The population within these wards are vulnerable to the risk of flooding, leaving 35% of Mumbai’s population exposed to the risk of flooding.
Chandivali belongs to the L-ward. While Govandi, which lies in the M-East ward, is not in one of the flooding hot spots, it is one of the poorest wards in the city.
As per the document, several habitations within the city are either just above mean sea level or located on hill slopes making these habitations most vulnerable to waterlogging, flooding and landslides when extreme climatic events occur.
The document says that fishing communities and other informal settlements along the coasts are at risk of inundation and storm events.
Partial submergence is warned if resilience activities are not taken up. Resilience activities refer to activities that minimize damage to people and infrastructure during natural disasters.
The MCAP also mentions that Mumbai experiences an average of six heavy rain events per year, five very heavy and four extremely heavy rain events. Between 2017 and 2020, there has been a steady increase in extremely heavy rainfall events. The rains of July 7th and 8th were classified as extremely heavy and were the heaviest in the past five years (since 2019) for July.
As a second step to the MCAP, the BMC released a Climate Budget Report on June 5th, 2024, to enable decision-makers and citizens to know Mumbai’s climate priorities and activities for the upcoming financial year.
Read more: Surviving the monsoon: Life in Mumbai’s coastal settlements
Floods and other coastal risks not prioritised
The MCAP has six sectoral priorities – energy and buildings, sustainable mobility, sustainable waste management, air quality, urban greening and biodiversity, and urban flooding and water resource management. Each sector has action tracks with sub-actions within them. The climate budget maps the department’s activities to the respective tracks.
Citizen Matters identified the action tracks that directly address the climate risks of urban flooding and coastal risk. One track from the Urban Greening and Biodiversity sector and two tracks from the Urban Flooding and Water Resource Management were selected.
A preliminary study of the tracks shows that the budget still needs to address most of the sub-actions within the tracks. Its focus has primarily been gardens, beautification and repairs of stormwater drains.
The plan also lists the ongoing initiatives by the BMC. They include construction of 10 feet of walls for mangrove and wetland protection, beach nourishment project being implemented in Dadar Chowpatty, Chimbai village waterfront project, online monitoring of pumping stations and their functioning parameters, underground holding tanks constructed for storing stormwater, especially during high tide/water logging incidents near Hindmata junction in September 2021.
Is the BMC doing enough to address the flood risks?
Planners and environmentalists have proposed several long term solutions to the challenge of floods and waterlogging in Mumbai.
“Several citizen groups have demanded to upgrade the existing British-era stormwater drains,” said Sarita Fernandes, a coastal researcher. “We need an honest assessment and mapping of all regions that have been concretised or choked with plastic, especially floodplains like the Mithi River, as most of the maps lack coherent data.”
Citing the United Nations-backed Sendai Framework, Sarita emphasised the importance of engaging with the community to reduce disaster risks. Mapping vulnerable days throughout the year and ensuring that necessary equipment is in place, along with community involvement, is crucial. The BMC should leverage Mumbai’s many citizen groups to enhance disaster management, explained Sarita.
The climate budget allocates little funding for research and even less for community engagement.
“Projects such as seawalls and waterfronts are not beneficial for Mumbai. This approach is outdated, and evidence shows that the more we use it, the more the coast erodes,” said Sarita. These measures are not resilient and lead to flooding and displacement.
Countries like Belgium, the Netherlands, and China have removed such infrastructure and restored wetlands and mangroves. One example is the Sponge City initiative in China, she said. “The best solution is to move away from concretisation and restore degraded zones. While it is expensive, it is feasible.”
Lack of inter-department coordination
The BMC has set up a new Environment and Climate change department on the recommendation of the MCAP. However, the department is not empowered to mediate and coordinate across departments. It acts as an environment protection and enforcement agency, rather than a planning department to implement the MCAP.
Citizen Matters wrote to the Environment and Climate Change department and will update the story once it responds.
Avni Agarwal, Program Manager at the World Resources Institute (WRI) and co-author of the MCAP said, “The environment department of the BMC has been revamped and institutionalised with additional powers and a structure to hire about 35 officers at the ward level. The department will be responsible for the monitoring and progress of climate-related activities.”
WRI served as a knowledge partner in preparing the MCAP and budget report. Since September 2021, WRI has collaborated with BMC and will continue to support and advise the corporation.
“The deputy municipal commissioner of the environment department can request information from the other departments,” explained Avni. “It’s a new mechanism that has been brought into BMC’s functioning.”
She also explained that future budgets depend on how different departments prioritise and understand the MCAP. This will again be an incremental process. She noted that the corporation has become more climate-sensitive than in previous years.
While these are steps in the right direction, swift action is crucial. As Sarita reminds, “It’s time-sensitive because it’s the poor and middle-class communities that suffer, as they usually live in flood-prone areas. Unless the BMC is ready to make systemic changes and truly study flood resilience as a subject, this will continue to be a greenwashing exercise.”