From Bengaluru to Mumbai to Pune, metro projects are colliding with India’s monsoons

In September 2022, Bengaluru's worst urban floods in recent memory swallowed the Outer Ring Road, including areas like Bellandur, Marathahalli, Mahadevapura, while the metro's Blue Line was under active construction through the same corridor. Three years later, the metro corporation still wasn't in the room when the city held its monsoon preparedness meeting. It was never invited. Weeks after that meeting, a hailstorm hit. Eight people died in an accident. The flooded areas sat directly above the upcoming Pink Line. Mumbai. Pune. Bengaluru. Same story, different cities. India is spending over Rs 2 lakh crore building metros that keep flooding the cities they're meant to fix. But the gap lies between the agencies building the city's infrastructure and the ones meant to take care of its drainage. Tune in. *Apply to become The Ken’s Intermission Producer *Apply for an audio production internship Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.