India, June 30 -- Expressing serious concern over the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation's (BMC) "casual" approach towards open or dangerous manholes that continue to claim lives, particularly during the monsoon, the Bombay High Court on Monday said the civic body's failure to resolve the issue for over two decades was unacceptable.

"The city cannot continue to suffer; it needs to end," observed a division bench of Justice A S Gadkari and Justice Kamal Khata, while seeking an assurance from the BMC that no human life would be lost due to open manholes during the ongoing monsoon. "It's high time that the BMC wakes up to reality and finally puts an end to this issue," the bench remarked, recording the civic body's statement that no deaths ...