kochi the corporation divisions which share its borders with edappallyvyttila stretch of the national highway bypass faced severe waterlogging on october 21 taking into account the houses in the areas on both sides of the nh bypass stretch more than 1000 houses and shops were flooded on the day heavy rains pummelled the cityat least 200 families faced the brunt of waterlogging in each division the narrow culverts across the national highway connecting the canals on either side of the road led to the flooding of houses streets and shopsencroachments on kareethodu a major canal passing through the palarivattom division added to the woes around 200 houses and shops in the area were inundated the width of the kareethodu has shrunk from seven metres to threefour metres over the years said v k minimol councillor from palarivattom divisionthe kareethodu passes through areas like vennala on the other side of the national highway before ending up in kaniyampuzha backwaters the width of the canal reduces to just halfametre when its passes through the culvert under the national highway minimol who is also the former chairperson of health standing committee of the corporation saidthough we approached the national highway authority of india nhai for constructing box culverts which have more width in place of the existing pipe culverts they didnt respond the nhai authorities do not allow us to even clean the culverts though cleaning is a herculean task she saidminimol has lodged complaints with the state government and district collector as well seeking their intervention to sort out the issue p v anil kumar president of peringot residents association which represents the residents on the peringot road also shared the view regions including palarivattom karanakkodam and thammanam located on the western side of the national highway bypass were inundated because the culverts across the road was too culvertsin santhipuram colony in karanakkodam division around 120 houses faced severe waterlogging there are 197 houses in the colony among them water entered around 120 houses after the rains on october 21 said joseph a resident it was an onerous task to clean the houses even sewage entered our houses we had to do several rounds of cleaning till today we havent completed cleaning the whole house said baby a housewife works were underway to raise the height of a culvert across the church road close to the colony which is said to be the immediate reason for the waterlogging sandfilled cement sacks were laid inside the culvert for supporting the structure as the concreting was just completed they blocked the flow of water another resident saidthe waterlogging in thammanam division was caused after the punchathodu which passes through four divisions of the corporation before it finally empties into the kaniyampuzha backwaters overflowed again encroachments on the canal led to the waters overtopping the banksduring 201015 the corporation authorities had given permission for a shopping complex owner to cover the canal with concrete slabs for up to 18 metres it would have made cleaning