Our disaster management is a disaster

At Quora the website which promises to get great answers to our questions one recent entry caught my eye ldquoShould Hurricane Sandy hit Mumbai to clean the garbage in the city Mumbai is very untidy people throw trash on roads highways the stations are pathetic So I guess Hurricane Sandy can at least clean the trash hererdquo Thankfully the question was tagged as sarcasm and has been flagged as needing attention from moderators ldquoWhat on earth could possibly make you look at a hurricane as a natural vacuum cleanerrdquo was the first answer an instinctive response for most of us While this exchange is a telling comment on our civic amenities and municipal services it also points to our casual approach towards natural disasters Not only are the government agencies illprepared for disaster management the public is equally unconcerned about the perils of a natural disaster Take the example of Mumbai On July 26 2005 the city received 994mm of rain the eighth heaviest ever recorded 24hour rainfall figure It resulted in overflows from an already inadequate drainage system Deluge The 2005 floods in Mumbai The overflow failed to drain out to the sea because of the maximum high tide level of 448m at that time The deluge claimed the lives of 900 people and left thousands stranded across the city A CORFU study blamed damming of upper reaches of the rivers infilling and levelling of the first and second order streams constriction of the mouth of Mithi River and Mahim Bay and reclamation of riverine wetlands for the disaster Siltation and clogging of drainage arteries resulted in reduction of river widths and depths compounding the problem of flooding Encroachments inside the riverbed as well as on the banks choked and constricted the water courses and aggravated flooding risks Following the 2005 floods city authorities drew up an extensive plan to overhaul the stormwater drainage system and develop the Mithi river to create outlets for water As this newspaper reported on June 29 2012 7 yrs and crores later flood control projects still incomplete although crores of rupees have been spent none of these projects have been completed The public doesnrsquot seem to care either We rarely engage our local representatives on this critical issue Flood control projects remain incomplete and the city is as illprepared for a deluge as it was seven years ago If this is the state of Mumbairsquos preparedness imagine the situation in the rest of the country Southern India was devastated by a tsunami in 2004 leading to a loss of almost 15000 lives Following Cyclone Thane in December 2011 Tamil Nadu government created a State Disaster Rescue Force SDRF Two SDRF teams of 35 personnel each were deployed during the recent Cyclone Nilam Although an improvement on the past this is still grossly inadequate For oneoff disasters like cyclones and tsunamis the lack of preemptive plans and rescue and relief measures can be fathomed in a developing country like India with limited resources and poor governance But nothing explains the failure to mitigate the floods which strike Assam Bihar and Odisha every year This when the flood damages suffered across the country between 1953 and 2010 are pegged at Rs 812500 crore and the government has spent about Rs 126000 crore on flood control both at 2011 prices Here is why To formulate the Twelfth Plan Planning Commission constituted a Working Group on flood management Even when the primary responsibility for flood control lies with the states their representatives in the working group principal secretaries of Bihar Assam Rajasthan Uttarakhand and Kerala were missing from grouprsquos deliberations The states did not provide information about flood management works or their requirement of funds for flood prevention There is no credible database with the states on frequency of flooding duration and depth of inundation The Centre is no better It launched the National Flood Control Programme in 1954 which led to the creation of National Flood Commission in 1976 Tasked to evolve a coordinated integrated and scientific approach to flood control and to draw a national plan the commission submitted the report in 1980 The report was accepted by the government but its recommendations were not implemented In 2001 the government set up an expert committee to review the implementation of recommendations The report of the expert committee is still under examination in the Ministry of Water Resources Forget plans and policies we still donrsquot have an accurate assessment of flood affected area in the country No wonder the severity of floods and the agony brought out by them still persists Sushant K Singh is Fellow for National Security at the Takshashila Institution and editor of PragatiThe Indian National Interest Reviewu00a0