The premises of several hospitals in Kolkata were inundated on Monday following heavy rain overnight, causing inconvenience to patients, and doctors and other hospital staff.
At some hospitals, water entered the buildings.
At SSKM Hospital, the ground floor of the gynaecology and cardiology buildings were flooded. Doctors, nurses and other hospital staff and relatives of patients had to wade through the water.
Pijush Roy, the medical superintendent of the hospital, said some parts of the SSKM campus were at a lower level compared with other sections. Waterlogging in the low-lying corners is unavoidable, he said.
“PWD engineers had worked since afternoon to pump out the water. By the evening the situation was much better,” he said.
Water entered the ground floor of all buildings at the KPC Medical College and Hospital in Jadavpur. An official said the road in front of the hospital — Raja SC Mullick Road — was flooded.
“The water bodies on and around our campus were overflowing. Naturally, water entered the ground floor of the buildings,” he said.
Portions of the School of Tropical Medical (STM) and the adjoining Calcutta Medical College and Hospital were flooded, too.
STM director Subhasish Guha said medicines were not damaged because they had taken adequate precautions.
The store in the basement was flooded. “Some old cartons and plastic containers used to collect samples were damaged,” he said.
PWD engineers, Guha said, started pumping out water from the campus once the rain’s intensity reduced. “By 7pm, all water had been drained out,” he said.
STM has shifted the laboratory medicine department, which handles costly equipment, from the ground to the second floor.
“We are now working on shifting the digital X-ray unit from the ground to an upper floor because the institution often gets flooded after rain,” he said.
As many as 17 rain measuring stations of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation recorded more than 100mm of rain between Sunday night and Monday afternoon.
An official said waterlogging was common in September because most canals remained filled to the brim from previous months’ rain.