"India's fourth-largest city, Chennai has boomed in the 21st century as a center for vehicle factories and IT outsourcing," writes Sanjeev Miglani for Reuters. "But trash-filled drains and building on lake beds in the rush to industrialization and prosperity has made it more prone to flooding."

"The floods have displaced about 1 million people in the Chennai area," according to a local reporter, writes Parth M.N. for the Los Angeles Times. Neglect of water storage may have contributed to the devastation.

(E)xperts believe poor city planning has magnified the devastation caused by a natural disaster. Many have gone a step further and called it a man-made disaster.

The head of Indian Meteorological Department, Laxman Singh Rathore, said (Dec. 2) that the flooding occurs because there is not enough space for the water to drain out, catchnews.com reported. In recent years, Chennai’s network of lakes, rivers, canals, wetlands and marshlands that previously absorbed rainwater or diverted it to the sea have been replaced by housing, malls, universities and businesses.

Chenai did not learn from Mumbai floods.