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This story is from July 30, 2016

After 20-hour Gurujam nightmare, now Haryana-Delhi blame game

Political blame game begins over Gurgaon traffic mess
TOI image
Key Highlights
  • For 20 hours, starting around 6 pm on Thursday, the Millennium City remained gridlocked, and waterlogged.
  • There was complete chaos on a 24km stretch of the Delhi-Gurgaon expressway as hundreds of trucks and state transport buses were stranded on the highway.
  • Haryana’s civic agencies blamed Delhi for the mess.
GURGAON: It was a jam that lasted so long and was so bad that it earned itself a unique name: Gurujam. For 20 hours, starting around 6 pm on Thursday, the Millennium City remained gridlocked, and waterlogged. And nobody really knows how much it rained in Gurgaon, because the city’s only rain gauge was not working.
A Met reading from nearby Palam showed just 5.8mm of rain till Friday morning.
It obviously rained more than that in Gurgaon but that alone could never have triggered this kind of an urban nightmare in a city that houses nearly half the Fortune 500 companies .
The situation was so bad that on Friday morning, Gurgaon police tweeted: “People coming to Gurgaon from Delhi are advised to stay back today to avoid being stuck in traffic jams due to flooding of roads.”
Trouble started around 6 pm on Thursday, and as the jam built up over time, people were stuck on the road for four to eight hours. Some reached home after midnight, some even later. Some just abandoned their cars and walked back.
But things got worse as heavy commercial vehicles were trapped in the web of snarls. There was complete chaos on a 24km stretch of the Delhi-Gurgaon expressway as hundreds of trucks and state transport buses were stranded on the highway due to water logging and traffic jams. A truck usually occupies space equal to three cars, therefore heavy vehicles on the road only worsened the situation. Cars which were left stranded by the owners who had walked home on Thursday, only added to the mess.

As dawn set in, news of waterlogged and choked streets poured in. Rajeev Chowk, Hero Honda Chowk, Golf Course Road, Badshahpur, Palam Vihar, Jharsa Chowk, Sushant Lok, Pataudi Road and Manesar were flooded with two to five feet of water resulting in heavy traffic jams. Spillovers spread till sectors 14, 15, 17 and 10, Khandsa Road, Sohna Road, Cyber City, Bristol Chowk, MG Road, Huda City Centre and Farrukhangar. Roads caved in near Hero Honda Chowk and on Golf Course Road which caused major snarls.
In pics: Heavy rains and waterlogging bring life to a standstill
Haryana’s civic agencies blamed Delhi for the mess. They said Delhi shut down the sluice gates of Najafgarh drain on Thursday evening. This led to the Badshahpur drain, which empties into Najafgarh drain, filling up to the brim. So, there was no way they could have pumped water into Badshahpur drain, which led to large-scale waterlogging.
Delhi, however, denied it shut the Najafgarh drain gates and said Haryana was trying to cover up its own follies.
The highway contractor Skylark Securitas Pvt Ltd, too, issued an advisory on Friday asking people to avoid NH8. A sense of normality was restored only around afternoon. “The toll authority waived the toll fee at the Kherki Daula plaza on Friday. This was done to decongest the Delhi-Gurgaon expressway. It aimed at a continuous traffic movement as vehicles stopping at the toll plaza added to the tailbacks,” said a highway official.
Subsequently, by 2pm, most of the city was jam-free though the heavy traffic slogged at certain areas for some time.
However, the Hero Honda Chowk became a point of concern for authorities. The cave-in of about five feet on the road was impossible to repair as it rained, plus, the water could not be drained out of this stretch. The jam continued and tailbacks were seen till Rajeev Chowk.
In fact, commissioner of police Navdeep Singh Virk pedalled to the Hero Honda Chowk via Rajeev Chowk and inspected the stretch. The traffic from Hero Honda Chowk and Sohna Road was diverted to Bhiwadi, Tawdu and Sohna.
“The cops will now be on round-the-clock duty to ensure there are no jams. The state administration has sent 250 home guards to Gurgaon. But we will advise people to not visit Gurgaon if it rains heavily again, and Hero Honda Chowk should be avoided for the next few days,” said Virk.
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