Mumbai: Heavy rains pounded the city and suburbs for the second day today, disrupting flight operations at the Mumbai airport and delaying suburban train services in the financial capital.

According to an official of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) disaster management cell, no untoward incident was reported after the incessant downpour.

Schools and colleges in Mumbai Metropolitan Region have been instructed to remain closed today in view of heavy rains.

“Several parts of the metropolis, including South Mumbai, Borivali, Kandivili, Andheri and Bhandup, received heavy rainfall. However, no untoward incident has been reported so far from any part of the city,” he said.

The Mumbai Police has warned of a high tide at 12.03 pm and 6.04 pm today.

From 8.30 am yesterday to 5.30 am today, the Colaba observatory recorded 210 mm rain, while the Santacruz observatory recorded 303.7 mm rain in the period, according to the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD).

Fishermen have been warned against venturing into the deep sea, an IMD official said.

Flight operations at the Mumbai airport were affected due to heavy rains and low visibility.

The skidding of a SpiceJet aircraft on the main runway (09/27) last night compounded the problem further as it forced the private airport operator to shift operations to the secondary runway, which can carry out limited operations.

The SpiceJet Boeing 737 aircraft carrying 183 people overshot a wet runway while landing at the airport in rain-hit Mumbai and got stuck in the mud, officials said yesterday, adding that all passengers were safely evacuated.

As many as 56 flights were diverted to different airports till this morning as the main runway continued to be out of use due to the SpiceJet aircraft stuck there, an airport official said.

The main runway at the Mumbai airport is unlikely to be functional before this evening as the SpiceJet aircraft remained stuck on it.

The Mumbai airport operator has been given NOTAM (notice to airmen) for the main runway till 2 pm, which means the flight operations cannot be carried out on it till that time, a senior official of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) said today.

The clearing of the main runway may take a longer time than expected and the operations there are unlikely to resume before evening, the official said.

Following the downpour, several airlines issued travel advisories to passengers.

The Mumbai airport, the country’s second busiest airport, handles 930 flights per day with an average of 48 movements per hour.

Suburban train services were running late by 10 to 15 minutes, an official said.

The trains witnessed lesser crowd today as many people proffered to remain indoors due to the heavy rain forecast.

According to Mumbai Police, the Harbour Line train services came to a halt for a brief period in the early hours today but later resumed.

Central Railway’s chief spokesperson Sunil Udasi said a few short-destination local trains had to be cancelled yesterday night to streamline the services.

“Since 10 pm yesterday, our services on the main and the harbour lines are running at regular intervals with lesser frequency and restricted speed in water-logging prone areas.

Our field staff and supervisors have been deployed to keep a tab on the water level,” Udasi said.

Senior railway officers were keeping a watch on the situation and the Railway Protection Force (RPF) personnel were roped-in to manage any crowds at the stations, he said.

The trains on the Western Line were also running late by 10 to 15 minutes, according to an official of the Western Railway (WR).

The long distance trains which were regulated and stranded at various locations due to heavy water-logging at Nallasopara, Virar have been cleared, WR said in a statement.

Some intercity trains like Manmad-Mumbai Express, Gujarat Express, Saurashtra Express, Bandra-Terminus Surat Intercity Express and Mumbai Central-Ahmadabad Shatabdi Express have been cancelled, as per the officials of the Central Railway and the Western Railway.

Vehicles were moving, though a bit slowly, on the city’s two major roads – the Eastern Express Highway and the Western Express Highway, the BMC official said.

Buses were running normal and there were no diversions in the routes, Brihanmumbai Electricity Supply and Transport (BEST) spokesperson Hanumant Gofane said.

The ‘dabbawalas’ of Mumbai today cancelled their delivery of over two lakh tiffins to office-goers in the city in view of the disruption of suburban rail services after heavy rains.

The tiffin delivery men use suburban trains to ensure lunch boxes reach their destination on time.

An IMD official said that the Santacruz observatory recorded 225.3 mm rain from 8.30 am to 11.30 pm last night.

This quantity falls under the weather category of ‘extremely heavy rain’ (204.5 mm and above), he said.

The observatory recorded over 100 mm in just three hours (5.30-8.30pm), the official added.

Mumbai recorded its second highest September rain in a span of 12 hours yesterday, BMC officials said.

The rainfall recorded at BMC’s automatic weather stations between 8 am and 10 pm included Nariman Point (88mm), Worli (110mm), Chembur (112mm), Mulund (94mm), Andheri (208mm), Bandra (128mm) and Borivli (204mm).

The MeT department has predicted heavy to very heavy rainfall till tomorrow.

All the agencies concerned have been put on high alert to deal with any eventuality.

(PTI)

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Mumbai: Maharashtra’s ruling ally Shiv Sena on Monday launched a sharp attack on the BJP for the runaway inflation and zooming fuel prices and said “Achhe Din” were being “murdered” daily by the government.

The party also took to task new union minister K.J. Alphons — who said recently that “those who can afford high prices of petrol and diesel are not starving” — for making “such highly irresponsible utterances.”

“This Navratna (Jewel) in the cabinet is justifying the steep high prices of fuel because he has never paid for it from his pocket. This is like spitting on the face of the poor who were not humiliated to such an extent even during the Congress rule,” the Sena said.

In strong editorials in the party mouthpieces ‘Saamana’ and ‘Dopahar Ka Saamana’, the Shiv Sena said it was shocking that Alphons even justified how nobody was dying because of the spiralling fuel prices.

“Listen to him! This bureaucrat-turned-minister with no political experience is probably full of the ‘merit’ that the BJP President Amit Shah said the Congress is lacking,” the Sena said.

“Have they forgotten, how – when there was a fuel hike during UPA, all top BJP leaders like Rajnath Singh, Sushma Swaraj, Smiri Irani and Dharmendra Pradhan – jammed the streets protesting with empty gas cylinders?” the Sena asked.

However, now when they have come to power, the poor were being mocked and ridiculed by persons like Alphons who were advocating inflation – and “all this is truly distressing”, the edit said.

“A major reason behind the thousands of farmers’ deaths in Maharashtra and elsewhere in the country is due to steep hike in fuel prices. There is the regular ‘shock of load-shedding’, so they have to depend on diesel-run generators for agriculture. Then, they are required to shell out higher prices for transportation of their farm produce to the distant markets.

“Many farmers simply can’t afford to pay all these high costs and hence resort to committing suicide,” the edit said.

The Sena pointed out that the masses were suffering because of the hike in petrol, diesel and gas prices. “‘Achhe Din’ are being killed daily,” it said.

“People have no food to eat, farmers continue to be in crises, inflation and unemployment are adding to peoples’ woes. When questioned about all these, a livid Maharashtra BJP legislator Pasha Patel abused and threatened a journalist last week and said he (the journalist) requires mental treatment,” the Sena said.

It said that from the billions of rupees to be spent on the Bullet Train project, if Rs 30,000-40,000 crore was diverted to tackle inflation, it would be serve everyone better.

“Patel called the journalist ‘mad and needing mental treatment’. Actually, it is those people who are praising the Bullet Train who are lunatics and deserve to be packed off to mental hospitals,” the Sena said.

(Agencies)

Hyderabad: A 24-year-old woman was allegedly burnt alive by her husband for not being able to secure a MBBS seat. The incident took place in Hyderabad in L B Nagar police station limits on Sunday night.

Harika had married her cousin Rushi Kumar (29), a resident of Rocktown Colony of L B Nagar, two years back.

Rushi wanted Harika to study MBBS and fulfil his dream of becoming a doctor. So he made her stay in a hostel and enrol to coaching classes. She appeared for medical entrance test by giving EAMCET exam but failed to secure a MBBS seat and instead secured a Bachelor of Dental Surgery seat at Kamineni Medical College.

According to Harika’s family, Rushi used to harass her for dowry and constantly pick fights with her.

On Sunday night, Rushi called Harika’s mother and told that she had immolated herself by pouring kerosene. The family rushed to her house and found her dead. “Harika’s husband claimed she committed suicide, but after seeing the scene of the offence, it appears to be a murder. We suspect that the man has killed his wife,” ACP (LB Nagar division) Venugopala Rao said.

As of now Rushi is in police custody and investigators registered a case under 174 (suspicious death) of Cr.PC.

(Agencies)

Ahmedabad: BJP President Amit Shah appeared before a special Sessions Court here on Monday in the 2002 Naroda Gam case in which 11 persons were killed and said the key accused and former Gujarat minister Maya Kodnani was with him when the crime took place.

Shah was summoned by the court after Kodnani claimed to have failed to get the BJP chief to depose as a witness in her favour despite repeated attempts. She submitted that she was unable to find Amit Shah or his address to issue the summons.

As many as 14 witnesses have deposed and 13 have been examined. She is among the 82 accused in the case.

The incident occurred on February 28, 2002, a day after a coach of the Sabarmati Express train was set on fire at the Godhra railway station leaving 57 Hindus dead.

Naroda Gam is close to Naroda Patiya where 97 Muslims were killed on the same day in which Kodnani was convicted in 2012 for life imprisonment.

Deposing in the court of Justice P.D. Desai on Monday, Amit Shah stated that Kodnani was with him in the Assembly and later at the Civil Hospital at Sola where the bodies of the Godhra train victims were brought.

Shah said he had gone to the Sola Civil Hospital since it fell under his constituency.

Speaking in defence of the former minister, Amit Shah submitted to the court in Gujarati: “Mayaben Kodnani was not at Naroda Gam but at the State Assembly at 8.30 am. From 9.30 a.m. to 9.45 a.m., I was at the Civil Hospital and I met Maya Kodnani there.”

He added that Kodnani was consoling families of those killed in the Godhra attack when he reached there.

Kodnani, who was a minister in 2002 in the Gujarat government led by Chief Minister Narendra Modi, wants to prove that on the day of the Naroda Gam killings she was not at the site of the crime.

(IANS)