Heavy rains lash Mumbai, suburbs; more heavy showers in next 24 hrs

Mumbai and its suburbs received heavy rainfall overnight and the weather department has issued a 'yellow' alert, predicting heavy rains in the city and adjoining areas on Tuesday, officials said.

Suburban services of the Central Railway were affected due to the rain, coupled with the failure of an express train engine during the morning rush hours.

Some commuters claimed the local trains were running late by 20-25 minutes.

Heavy rains lashed Bandra, Dahisar, Chembur, Fort, Matunga, Byculla and other areas of the city during the night, as per civic officials.

There was no major waterlogging anywhere on Tuesday morning as the rain intensity reduced, they said.

Road traffic was normal though it slowed down a bit.

Central Railway's (CR) chief public relations officer Dr Shivraj Manaspure told PTI that the engine of the Gorakhpur-LTT Superfast Express developed a technical snag at Atgaon station in neighbouring Thane district, but they arranged a relief engine for the train.

Trains on the route were diverted via a loop line, he said.

Some commuters complained the CR suburban services were delayed by 10-15 minutes since early morning, but after the engine failure incident, the trains were running late by 20 to 25 minutes.

They also claimed some suburban trains were cancelled and as a result, crowds swelled on platforms and trains during the morning rush time.

A Western Railway spokesperson said suburban services on their network were normal.

Bus services of the Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) undertaking were normal and there was no route diversion due to the rains, civic officials said.

The India Meteorological Department's (IMD) Mumbai centre, in its daily forecast issued at 8 am, predicted "heavy rain in the city and suburbs with very heavy rainfall at isolated places" in the next 24 hours.

In its "district forecast and warnings" for next five days issued on Monday, the IMD Mumbai forecast "heavy to very heavy rainfall at isolated places" in the city on Tuesday.

The IMD Mumbai officials said their observatories in Colaba (representative of the island city) and Santacruz (representative of suburbs) recorded 102.4 mm and 109.7 mm rainfall, respectively, in the 24-hour period ending at 8.30 am on Tuesday.