Rajasthan rains: Private school bus crosses flooded Gambhir river; heavy downpour disrupts life

NEW DELHI: A viral video from Bharatpur shows a school bus packed with children being driven through the overflowing Gambhir river, with the driver risking their lives while ferrying them home after school. Locals alleged that despite the river being in spate due to heavy rains, the bus driver attempted to cross it, endangering the children. The incident, which occurred on September 2, came to light after the video of the bus struggling against gushing waters surfaced on social media.Heavy rainfall across Rajasthan disrupted rail and road traffic, with Jaipur and Kota districts facing severe waterlogging. The downpour caused train stoppages, highway closures, and widespread flooding, affecting daily life and triggering power outages. Nine trains were halted on the Kota-Mumbai route after landslips near Dara railway station. The Kota-Jhalawar National Highway-52 was closed due to waterlogging in the Dara stream. In Dausa, two police personnel were injured when a police van collided with a truck on the rain-soaked Jaipur-Agra highway. Jaipur city witnessed major disruptions as several localities—including Tonk Road, Walled City areas, Jawahar Nagar, Raja Park, Moti Dungari Road, Gopalpura, Tonk Phatak, and Ajmer Road—were submerged under four to five feet of water. The Sawai Man Singh Hospital and Kala Hanuman Ji temple were also inundated, causing hardships for patients, visitors, and devotees. Many areas additionally reported power cuts. Jaipur Meteorological Centre Director Radheshyam Sharma explained that the monsoon trough extends from Bikaner and Jaipur through Madhya Pradesh’s Datia and Sidhi, to Odisha’s Puri and further into the Bay of Bengal. A second trough passes through Punjab, Haryana, and northeast Rajasthan. The weather office has issued an orange alert for Banswara and Pratapgarh districts, warning of very heavy rainfall, and a yellow alert for Alwar, Baran, Bundi, Bharatpur and nearly a dozen other districts. A low-pressure system over the Bay of Bengal is expected to sustain active rainfall in Rajasthan until September 7, with increased activity predicted in Jodhpur and Bikaner divisions between September 5 and 7.