The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Slew of disasters changed it all

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jul 20, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Slew of disasters changed it all

R.K. Radhakrishnan

TRAINING: R. Santhanam, State Relief Commissioner (centre) with N.M. Prusty, Chairperson, Sphere India (extreme right) and Chandramohan, Chennai Collector, in Chennai on Tuesday. — Photo: R. Ragu

CHENNAI: : There was a time when top government officials dealing with disaster hardly spent any time on the subject. They had other pressing responsibilities: they formed the cutting edge of the State's revenue collection operations.

"I do not know if it is my bad luck. In the past three years, we have been facing one disaster after another... Earlier Relief Commissioners hardly spent 20 per cent of their time on disaster management," said State Relief Commissioner R. Santhanam, inaugurating a three-day training programme on `Sphere standards for relief and rehabilitation', organised by the Chennai NGOs Coordination Council. The standards were drawn up by Sphere India, a coalition of government and non-government agencies involved in humanitarian initiatives.

The State faced successive droughts, in 2002-03 and 2003-04. Then came the 2004 floods that caused extensive damage to standing crops and property in the delta districts. The year ended with the tsunami. As Commissioner of Revenue Administration, Mr. Santhanam was also State Relief Commissioner during these difficult years.

For many years, disaster management meant dealing with regular droughts and occasional floods for revenue officials. But the series of recurring disasters changed all that.

Mr. Santhanam admitted that he spent more than 80 per cent of his time on disaster relief and rehabilitation. Even now, more than six months after the incident, he spends more than 50 per cent of his time on rehabilitation efforts.

Because of the experiences gained, the many gaps in disaster management were closed. Everyone in the Government — from the office assistant to the entry-level officers — had to be trained in disaster relief.

Right now, there was lack of sustained long-term training at the community level, and most efforts were project-based. This needed to be addressed, he said.

Moreover, the type of disasters varied from coastal regions to the plains to the hills. Hence, the disaster mitigation and management-training module should take into account all these aspects.

Chennai Collector S. Chandramohan explained the steps taken by the Government to ensure minimum standards of living were made available to tsunami victims.

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