85% work of protecting manholes finished, all work will be completed by August 10: BMC tells Bombay HC

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has completed about 85% work of installing protective iron meshes over manholes in flood-prone areas across the city, the Bombay High Court was told today.

The BMC said that this initiative was aimed at preventing accidents and deaths of citizens due to falling in open manholes during heavy rains.

BMC counsel Anil Sakhre submitted an affidavit before a bench of Justices Ranjit More and Anuja Prabhudessai hearing a PIL filed by the Federation of Retail Traders Welfare Association.

The PIL was filed following the death of Bombay Hospital gastroenterologist Dr Deepak Amrapurkar last year after he fell into an open manhole during heavy rains.

The cover of the manhole had been illegally removed by some locals to allow the water accumulated due to heavy rains in the Elphinstone Road area to seep through.

Last month, the BMC had told the court that it had covered around 1400 manholes across the city with such safety meshes.

Today, it submitted that it had identified an additional 840 manholes and had begun the process of covering them with the iron meshes. The bench accepted the civic body's request for time till August 10 this year to complete the exercise.