urban rainforest

jairaj pathak seemed an impressive man.
handled the media well as the rain began to submerge bombay.
he was on various news channels belting out an informed and controlled view of the whole rain and logging situation.
this was impressive not just because it was informed and controlled but because no municipal commissioner of bombay has had the guts to be so accessible to the media on a rainy day before this.
the BMC's best foot forward in the past has been silence/hapless PR manager.here was the real municipal commissioner being candid on CNBC and telling us that the problem at milan subway was the fact that it was below sea level. telling us to expect it to get worse with high tide. telling us that the showers were moving northward and that the situation in the northern suburbs was being specifically monitored.
here was a man in charge.
this was a promising step forward.

unfortunately it all crumbled under the rain.
the infrastructure gave way as mr.pathak had told us it would if it rained more than 40mm.
and today, like a wet bombay day every year, it rained more than 40 mm.

the news channels reaped a bounty.
the BMC/MMRDA were gleefully crucified, the janta vented its fury, mr.pathak disappeared from media view and bombay's shanghai aspirations were hung from an umbrella.

my city turned into an urban rainforest and my dad whined about having to leave the movie-theatre mid-way through Die Hard 4.0.
the good news is the electricity dint ditch us.
cheers to that.

p.s: the MET department claims to have warned us about the rain in advance. right.