LSGI’s role crucial in disaster mitigation: Thomas Isaac

People’s Plan Campaign can go beyond representative democracy, said Kerala Finance Minister T.M. Thomas Isaac

Children paint on a canvas to raise funds for flood relief on September 25, 2018 in an event organised by Institute for Sustainable development and Governance.

Finance Minister T.M. Thomas Isaac has stressed on the role of Local Self-Government Institutions (LSGI) in disaster mitigation.

The proactive efforts undertaken during the post-2018 flood relief measures were example enough to show how the People’s Plan Campaign could go beyond representative democracy, he said.

He was inaugurating a two-day national conclave on disaster risk reduction, organised by the Institute for Sustainable Development and Governance (ISDG), here on Saturday.

Better than bureaucracy

“Local bodies played a crucial role in operating relief camps and ensuring the optimum distribution of goods among the affected families. While we might not have achieved all of the objectives of the People’s Plan campaign, our local self-governments are better than the State government bureaucracy in many respects,” he said.

NITI Aayog working committee (civil society organisations) member and Orissa-based NGO CYSD co-founder Jagadananda J. called for focusing on disaster risk reduction efforts at the panchayat level.

Dr. Isaac released an expert report of disaster risk reduction on the occasion.