Disaster Management: Indian Red Cross to fly higher, faster

New Delhi, July 18 (UNI) The Indian Red Cross Society (IRCS) today commended the government for remarkable improvement in its disaster management strategies, saying there was a paradigm shift in its approach with focus on 'mitigation and preparedness'.

It also announced that it would expand its scale of operations and extend these to more States.

''We are anyday better prepared than before the devastating Tsunami to deal with the both man made and natural calamities at present,'' IRCS Secretary General S P Aggarwal told UNI in an interview.

Dr Agarwal said the focus of disaster management in India earlier was on providing relief to the victims by giving them food, shelter and medical aid. But after the enactment of the Disaster Management Act and consequential formation of the National Disaster Management Authority, there has been a paradigm shift in dealing with both man made and natural calamities.

''Today we can talk of mitigation and disaster preparedness,'' Dr Agarwal quipped.

The IRCS is scaling up its operations and plans are afoot to extend its programme to three new States, namely Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Tripura, he added.

IRCS was keen to bring all States under the fold of its Disaster Management Programme. However, doing so would depend upon several factors, including the willingless of the State government concerned, the availability of societies resources in that area, volunteerism and availability of other funds, Dr Agrawal said.

The IRCS Disaster Management Programme is currently under various stages of implementation in eight most disaster prone states -- Gujarat, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, West Bengal, Bihar and Asom -- since 2003.

Mr Agarwal outlined the role being played by the IRCS, which includes significant efforts in comunity level preparedness, providing shelters in cyclone prone areas like Orissa, raising platforms, establishing rubber tube wells, such as in States like Asom and Bihar, and setting up community radios, for instance those in Andhra Pradesh.

The secretary general said this was high quality work and generally recognised as a model worth emulating for disaster preparedness and management.

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