With the President having given his assent to the Disaster Management Bill, the National Disaster Management Authority will be in place soon, Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil said Monday.
Though policy making would be done at the national level, there was a need to set up district-level authorities, he said, inaugurating the Centre For Disaster Mitigation and Management at the Vellore Institute of Technology. Patil said many state governments like Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal and Punjab had already taken steps to set up the state-level Disaster Management Authority.
"But much more remains to be done as several other states have to be persuaded to have such state-level authorities, besides constituting district-level authorities so that disasters in future were handled with ease by implementing the plans." Patil said the Indian government was not going to stop with the setting up of a national-level body. "We would also like to cooperate with our neighbouring countries like Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh and all other SAARC nations in dealing with matters relating to disasters."
Stressing that pre-disaster management was more crucial as compared to the post-disaster management, the Minister said if such authorities were set up in cooperation with all SAARC countries, it would pave the way for uniting all the countries in the world in disaster management concept.
Patil said the central and the state governments were in a position to spend money on disaster management. "We have the equipment, adequate manpower to deal with such disasters. What is required is that much more should come from the people. Without the help of the people, it will not be a full success story."
The Centre has now decided to involve civil defence organisation in disaster management. "We are also going to request the state governments to train their reserve police personnel to handle disaster management activities."
Referring to the earthquakes in Latur in Maharashtra, and Bhuj in Gujarat, Patil said he was glad that the disaster management bill was passed in Parliament recently with the help of all the parties and their leaders.
"With the President having given his assent, it has now become an act," he said.
Lauding the Vellore Institute of Technology for having opened the Centre for Disaster Mitigation and Management, Patil said it was necessary for the central government to have connectivity with the 300 national laboratories in the country and several institutions and universities, to warn us as to what could be done to manage future disasters in the country.
