Pune: Sunday was an extremely wet day for Pune district . The catchme0nt of Temghar dam recorded 225mm rain between 6am on Saturday and 5pm on Sunday while Varasgaon received 178mm rain. Panshet recorded 171mm rain, Mulshi (155mm), Pavana (139mm) and Khadakwasla (57mm) for the same period.
Barring Mulshi and Pavana, the three others are located upstream of Khadakwasla and water discharged from them flows into Khadakwasla and into the Mutha River which passes through Pune city. The cumulative effect of a stepped-up discharge reflected in the swollen Mutha River and flood in the low-lying areas off Sinhagad Road in Pune city. A similar situation was caused by the discharge into the Mula and Pavana rivers that pass through Pimpri Chinchwad.
Pavana river passes through the heart of Pimpri Chinchwad, covering over 20km distance, while Mula river covers about 14km in PCMC limits. The discharge from Panshet and Varasgaon dams was increased at the rate of 10,000 cusecs on Sunday morning and further to 11,832 cusecs and 11,858 cusecs, respectively, on Sunday evening. This water flowed into Khadakwasla and irrigation authorities had to increase the discharge to 45,000 cubic foot per second (cusecs) at 5.
30pm on Sunday from the earlier 35,000 cusecs at 11am. The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) closed the Jayantrao Tilak Bridge in front of the new PMC headquarters in Shivajinagar for commuters as a precautionary measure. An alert was sounded along all the rivers flowing through Pune dis.