Home Minister Amit Shah chairs meeting to make India disaster-resilient

NEW DELHI: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday chaired a meeting with ministers of disaster management of the states and Union Territories to strengthen the disaster risk reduction system in the country to make India disaster resilient.

Various issues related to disaster management were also discussed with the administration of states and UTs under Vision 2047 of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, said a Ministry of Home Affairs statement.

In his address, Shah also announced three major schemes of over Rs 8,000 crore regarding disaster management in the country.

Had a meeting with the disaster management ministers of the states/UTs in New Delhi.

India's disaster management approach has gone through drastic changes under the Modi Govt. Instead of merely ensuring relief post-disaster, now the focus is on minimizing the loss of lives. pic.twitter.com/iuNfazyIpX

— Amit Shah (@AmitShah) June 13, 2023

The schemes included a Rs 5,000 crore project to expand and modernise fire services across the states; Rs 2,500-crore project to reduce the risk of urban flooding in the seven most populous metros — Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad and Pune; and Rs 825 crore National Landslide Risk Mitigation Project for landslide mitigation in 17 states and UTs.

He said it should be our endeavour that not a single person’s life is lost due to disaster, and under the leadership of Prime Minister Modi, all the states have made efforts towards achieving this goal in the last five years. Shah said the Centre and the states have achieved many milestones in the last nine years, but we cannot be complacent.

Noting that the nature of the disasters has changed and their frequency and intensity have also increased, the Home Minister advised sharpening and broadening preparedness to deal with them. “Many new disasters are being encountered at various places and we have to be prepared for them”, he said.

Shah said that post-2004, after extensive discussion on disaster management at the national level, a collective responsibility and response mechanism was developed at the Centre and state levels.

Shah said that under the leadership of Prime Minister Modi, the government has provided more than 220 crores of free Corona vaccines, arranged food for crores of poor people, brought back lakhs of labourers to their hometowns and made arrangements to address their concerns through DBT.

“Till a few years back, our approach towards disaster was reactionary and relief-centric, and during the last nine years, under the leadership of PM Narendra Modi, with collective hard work and dedication, we have implemented on the ground a new approach of early warning system, prevention, mitigation and preparedness-based disaster management”, said Shah.

He said that the Modi government has set a target of preparing around one lakh youth volunteers in 350 high-risk disaster-prone districts, and this is showing very good results during disasters. Shah said that under the leadership of Prime Minister Modi, the Centre has made proactive efforts to help the states during the last four years by sending IMCT teams 73 times within a time frame of just 10 days.

He said that comparing the nine years from 2005-06 to 2013-14 with 2014-15 to 2022-23, the fund of Rs 35,858 crore allocated to SDRF has now almost tripled to Rs 1,04,704 crore. In addition, the minister said that the release of funds from NDRF has increased by nearly three times from Rs 25,000 crore to Rs 77,000 crore.

He said that due to the proactive approach, the Centre and states have increased budgetary provisions in the areas of disaster risk reduction and post-disaster relief and rehabilitation. He said that in the year 2021, the National Disaster Mitigation Fund was constituted under the Central government with Rs 16,700 crore and under SDMF, Rs 32,000 crore has been kept for mitigation activities.

Shah said that the India Disaster Resource Network has been catalogued across the nation and over one lakh new records have been entered in it. “Provision has also been made to implement Common Alerting Protocol through SMS at a cost of Rs 354 crore. Steps like Disaster Management Information System Portal, and 112 Emergency Response Support System are useful and multi-pronged initiatives”, he said.

He said that PM Modi has initiated the tradition of awarding the Subhash Chandra Bose Aapda Prabandhan Puraskar to individuals and organisations who have contributed to the field of disaster management. The Home Minister said that 271 wetlands have been identified in the Northeast by ISRO for flood management in the country.

“Earlier, IMD used to give three days advance forecast of rainfall and flood caused by it, it is now issued five days in advance which provides extra time for rescue efforts. Directions have been given to issue it seven days in advance by next year”, the Home Minister added. (ANI)