Overnight rain caused by Cyclone Remal flooded Park Street and Esplanade Metro stations, crippling the transport lifeline of Calcutta for hours on Monday morning.

Water seeped through “leakages” in the sewage line of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) that is above the roof of the subway at Park Street station, said Metro officials. The waterlogging continued for three hours, till the water was removed with the help of pumps and manually with buckets.

A Metro engineer said the Park Street and Esplanade stations had been constructed in the 1980s. Back then the concrete available was not fully waterproof. The stations had been designed in such a way that rainwater could enter the stations and then get pumped out.

The high volume of rain and the leak in the sewage line resulted in the stations and tracks getting flooded. “We could not pump out enough water in time,” the engineer said.

From 11.30am on Sunday till 11.30am on Monday, the city received around 170mm of rain. In Met parlance, 60mm of rain in 24 hours is considered “heavy rainfall”.

A KMC official said Metro did not inform the civic body about the alleged leakage. “Nobody from Metro Railway reached out to us about the problem,” said the official.

A few trains ran the full course between Dakshineswar and New Garia (Blue Line) in the morning. But rain kept coming and the water inside the stations was not receding. So, keeping in mind passengers’ safety, the services in the affected section were stopped, another Metro official said.

From around 9am till 12.05pm on Monday, trains did not run between Girish Park and Tollygunge.

The carrier initially ran a truncated service between Dakshineswar and Girish Park in the north and between Tollygunge and New Garia in the south. From around 10.20am, the services were extended between New Garia and Maidan, said an official.

The Metro authorities then started removing the water from the tracks as well as the stations with help of pumps and also manually, using buckets. Normal services resumed at 12.05pm.

Behala resident Biswajit Bera, 63, who was travelling to his workplace at Esplanade, reached the Tollygunge Metro station in the morning only to find that the north-bound service had been suspended.

“I did not get a bus and hence opted for Metro. I came to know that the train service had been suspended after I reached the station. I waited for an hour but did not get a train to Esplanade,” Bera said.