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Nearly five months after the giant tsunami killer tidal waves smashed into the Indian coastline leaving a trail of massive destruction and loss of lives, the Government is still continuing with the rehabilitation measures. Though the initial rescue and relief measures were mounted on a massive scale soon after the tsunami disaster on December 26 last, the focus has now been on building temporary shelters, dwelling units, schools and hospitals and providing infrastructure in the worst-hit areas along the Southern coastal States.
If Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Pondicherry have a well-established administrative machinery to take care of the rehabilitation measures, it was the worst-hit Andaman and Nicobar Islands where the Union Home Ministry had to organise all relief and rehabilitation measures with the assistance of the armed forces and the Central para-military forces.
President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam visited Andaman and Nicobar Islands on May 5-6. He appreciated the quality and pace of rehabilitation work over there. The Home Minister Shivraj Patil, told Parliament that it would take nearly three years and a whopping Rs. 10,000 crore on rebuilding the infrastructure in the islands and tsunami-hit areas in other States. The Government approved a special relief of Rs. 3,644 crore named as “Rajiv Gandhi Rehabilitation Package” for the tsunami-affected areas for an immediate revival of fishery and agriculture.
Shifting of tribals and non-tribals from temporary shelters to intermediary shelters has been going on in a planned way. Nearly 80 per cent of the relief camps-based population has been shifted and the remaining would shift by May-end. About Rs. 240 crore has also been set aside to reclaim the salinated land for agriculture. The revival of agriculture and farming could take a season or two. About 85 schools had been destroyed and 34 were severely damaged. Construction and repair of schools and hospital buildings is likely to be completed by August 15.
The Government also considered the fact that the fishermen and others have lost their houses and means of livelihood. Funds have been earmarked to the States for construction of their intermediary structures and providing them fishing equipment and boats.
Strategy
If the tsunami disaster wrought havoc on an unprecedented scale, it spurred the Government machinery to evolve a strategy to face natural disasters in future in a better way. It was acknowledged internationally that India had done a quick and commendable job while responding to the tsunami disaster. But a lot needed to be done in terms of laying down the policy and putting the capacity building measures in place. A need was also felt over time to vest the coordination mechanism with the necessary legislative back up to enable holistic coordination of resources for response. The Disaster Management Bill, 2005 was introduced in Parliament’s Budget session. It would take some time before the Bill becomes law. Hence the Union Cabinet has passed a resolution to put the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) in place, to be headed by the Prime Minister. The 10-member NDMA, to be notified in the gazette soon, would take care of all aspects relating to disaster response.
Among other things, the Bill envisages creation of a national disaster response force to deal with the after-effects of the man-made and natural disasters like biological, chemical and radiological attacks, earthquakes, floods and cyclones. About 8,000 personnel drawn from Central para-military forces have been trained and earmarked as a specialised unit to carry out relief and rescue operations. Training of trainers has been completed for fine-tuning their response to natural disasters. As many as 18 specialist response teams have been trained for quick response to natural disasters. The Bill also proposes to keep the administrative machinery down to the district level in a fully prepared mode, complete with equipment and kits to launch relief and rehabilitation measures without any delay should a natural calamity or man-made disaster strike anywhere in the country.
A warning system on Tsunami is being installed in the Indian Ocean by the Department of Ocean Development at a cost of Rs. 125 crore.
A core group has also been constituted in the Planning Commission, to plan and provide for long-term rehabilitation and reconstruction of hazard-proof permanent houses. Though the Government did not seek any external assistance for immediate relief and rescue operations, it is considering aid and assistance from multilateral agencies like the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, European Union and the UN agencies for long-term reconstruction purposes. Natural disasters cannot be prevented. But an efficient disaster management system can certainly mitigate their devastating effects.
Temporary shelters provided to an affected families
Officials inspecting facilities at temporary shelters
More of Tsunami - Tsunami Report
*Journalist
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