Deccan Chronicle 31.12.2009

Disaster management plan still on paper

Dec. 30: Karnataka’s worst floods yet has come and gone, but the government’s Disaster Management Plan - an action plan that recommends emergency and rescue measures be adopted by the authorities when a disaster strikes – remains exactly where it has always been – on paper.

Six months have gone by since the Administrative Training Institute (ATI), Mysore, which prepared the report, submitted the draft to the government and over a month since Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa directed the Disaster Management Cell to roll out the Plan at the earliest. On October 16, the chief minister who also happens to be the Chairman of the Disaster Management Cell, convened a meeting to deliberate on the Plan, which is long overdue.

Sources in the Institute told this newspaper that over 60 copies of the finalized draft had been sent across to the Cell. “After the meeting held by the CM, we were consulted a couple of times to make changes in the draft. However copies of the final drafts have been sent across to the Cell. One wonders what is taking the department so long to approve the Plan,” said an ATI source.

In this 300-page draft with 11 chapters, ATI experts have indicated that 22.3% of the total area in the state is earthquake prone, while 80% of the total area is drought prone and the measures that need to be taken to tackle these.

Officials have also visited 24 districts and introduced disaster management training programmes in 12 districts.

Capacity building and training, roping in the private sector, drawing up strategies to incorporate remote sensing and warning systems will be points of focus. The Plan also talks about drafting insurance plans and standards of procedure for departments including police, health, power, irrigation, agriculture, animal husbandry, PWD and transport.

The government had paid the Institute Rs 3.5 lakh to prepare the Plan.