Traffic crawls in Delhi as afternoon rain leaves several areas waterlogged

New Delhi, Jul 22 (PTI) Moderate rainfall in Delhi-NCR area on Monday afternoon caused waterlogging in several areas and affected traffic movement across the city.

Visuals from different areas showed vehicles wading through inundated roads. Several vehicles, including public transport, broke down amid the waterlogging and traffic had to be diverted to other routes.

Safdarjung, the city's primary weather station, recorded a rainfall of 31.1 mm while Pitampura recorded 48.5mm of rainfall and Delhi University recorded 39.5 mm of rainfall till 3 pm.

According to the parameters, 2.5-15.5 mm of rain is considered light rainfall, 15.6 mm-64.4 mm as moderate, 64.5-115.5 mm as heavy, 115.6-204.4 mm as very heavy and over 204.5 mm as extremely heavy.

The maximum temperature in the city settled at 36.4 degrees Celsius, a notch above the season's normal, according to the India Meteorological Department (IMD).

The relative humidity at 5.30 pm stood at 91 per cent.

The weather office has forecasted moderate rainfall for Tuesday, with the maximum and minimum temperatures likely to hover around 35 and 27 degrees Celsius, respectively.

The city will be on "yellow" alert for the next two days, the IMD said.

The Delhi Traffic Police issued alerts apprising commuters to avoid affected routes that are facing jams and advised people to plan their journey accordingly.

In a series of posts on X, the Delhi Traffic Police informed commuters about the affected routes.

Traffic was affected on Ring Road in the carriageway from Lajpat Nagar towards AIIMS due to breakdown of a bus at Moolchand Underpass. Meanwhile, both the carriageways of New Rohtak road due to waterlogging at Anand Parbat near lane number 10 and on Rohtak Road in the carriageway from Nangloi towards Tikri Border and vice-versa were affected due to sewer overflow and potholes on road between Rajdhani park and Mundka, it said.

Traffic was also affected on GTK Road due to waterlogging near GTK Depot and diverted towards Wazirabad side.

The commuters also took to social media and said that the traffic was heavy from Greater Kailash-1 to Chirag Delhi flyover, on Kirti Nagar road due to waterlogging, on Rohtak Road.

The central control room of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi received four complaints of waterlogging due to the downpour and three incidents of falling of trees were reported till 6 pm.

According to Delhi PWD, they received 43 complaints regarding waterlogging out of which 13 were resolved and work on 29 complaints is still underway.

The department has received five calls regarding tree falling. PTI SLB SJJ NIT NSM NB