West Bengal Disaster Management 2008

More effective prevention strategies would not only save tens of billions of dollars, but tens of thousands of lives. Funds currently spent on intervention and relief could be devoted to enhancing equitable and sustainable development instead, which would further reduce the risk of war and disaster. Building a culture of prevention is not easy. While the costs of prevention have to be paid in the present, their benefits lie in a distant future. Moreover, the

REDUCING DISASTER RISK A CHALLENGE FOR DEVELOPMENT

DISASTER MANAGEMENT ACT, 2005 (SEC –2) DISASTER : A CATASTROPHE, MISHAP, CALAMITY OR GRAVE OCCURRENCE IN ANY AREA  ARISING FROM NATURAL OR MAN MADE CAUSES  OR BY ACCIDENT OR NEGLIGENCE WHICH RESULT IN SUBSTANTIAL LOSS OF LIFE OR HUMAN SUFERRING  OR DAMAGE DAMAGE TO AND DESTRUCTION OF PROPERTY,  OR DAMAGE TO AND DEGRADATION OF ENVIRONMENT,  AND IS OF SUCH A NATURE AND MAGNITUDE AS TO BE BEYOND THE COPING CAPACITY OF THE COMMUNITY OF THE AFFECTED AREA.

Disaster is the interface of an extreme physical event and Human vulnerability

Disasters cause humanitarian, economic, and ecological impacts   Direct Loss of capital stock

Disaster Impacts

Economic Costs

Indirect e.g. business interruption

Humanitarian Effects

Macroeconomic e.g. loss of GDP

Ecological Effects

Determinants of natural disasters  

A natural hazard is the necessary condition for the occurrence of a disaster. However only when hazards intersect with exposed, vulnerable elements at risk will a disaster occur and cause humanitarian, economic and ecological effects. Natural hazards thus are triggering disaster events, but it is the elements at risk and their degree of vulnerability inherent in a social system that will define the final consequences. Thus natural disaster risk can be said to be defined by three factors: hazard, elements at risk, and vulnerability

VULNERABILITY It is defined as “the extent to which a community, structure, service and geographic area is likely to be damaged or disrupted by the impact of particular hazard, on account of their nature, construction and proximity to hazardous terrain or a disaster

DISASTER RISK •RISK is a measure of expected loses due to a hazard event of a particular magnitude occurring in a given area over a specific time period. The level of RISK depends upon – • Nature of the Hazard. • Vulnerability of the elements affected. • Economic value of those elements.

DISASTER MANAGEMENT •Disaster management is basically a range of activities designed to mitigate the effects of disaster and to provide a framework for helping people at risk to avoid or recover from the impact of the disaster. •It involves steps to be taken prior to, during and after the disaster.

An important question is the extent to which successive disasters have thwarted the attainment of government development objectives of poverty reduction and sustained growth. A related issue is whether there are measures that could be taken

Bringing disaster risk reduction and development concerns closer together requires three steps: a. The collection of basic data on disaster risk and

the development of planning tools to track the relationship between development policy and disaster risk. b. The collection and dissemination of best practice in development planning and policy that reduce disaster risk.

Risks Governments Assume Once probabilistic estimates of loss are determined, it is essential to know the responsibility of the government for those losses. Generally, two broad categories of government responsibility can be defined: • risk arising from government ownership of assets, • risk government assumes for others. In the first category is the probability of loss to government buildings, including schools and hospitals, and infrastructure, like roads and bridges. The second category focuses attention on risk that the government assumes for others. This generally includes the risk to homeowners, agriculture, local governments, and the poor.

STATUS OF DISASTER PREPAREDNESS IN WEST BENGAL









Relief in West Bengal and possibly for that matter in the country, is fall out of the great famines of colonial era. The British India prepared the Bengal Famine Code, 1913 and Bengal Famine Manual, 1941 to tackle the impact of famine. Relief was part of the Department of Food, Relief and Supplies, under the State Government. The Dept published the Manual for Relief of Distress in 1959 by replacing the two manuals The Department of Relief in its present form was created by bifurcating the then Department of Relief and Social Welfare in 1982.

The Department of Relief restructured to Department of Disaster Management in 2006.

Area

88752 sq.km

Population & Density Sex ratio

8,01,76,197 (2001 census) 7 903 Male 51.72 %

Female 48.28%

Rural / Urban ratio

Rural 71.97%

Urban 28.03%

Worker & non-worker ratio Worker 36.78% Literacy

Male 77.58%

Area under cultivation

62.4%

Cropping intensity

177%

No of districts

18 (excluding Kolkata) 66

No of sub divisions

Non-worker 63.22% Female 60.22%

No. of Blocks

341

No. of Gram Panchayats

3354

No. of mouzas

40782

No. of municipalities

120

No. of municipal corporations6 No. of districts under DRMP 10 No. of blocks under DRMP

194

No. of municipalities under DRMP

76

No. of mouzas under DRMP

26540

FLOOD  CYCLONE/HAILSTORM/KALBAISHAKHI  EARTHQUAKE  LANDSLIDE  DROUGHT  EROSION 



State level:

1. State Disaster Management Authority with Chief Minister as the Chairperson, MIC of Dept. of Disaster Management as the ViceChairperson and MICs of the Depts of Finance, Agriculture, H&FW, Fire, I&W, CD and Chief Secretary of the State Govt as members 2. State level Disaster Management Committee consisting of the Secretaries of the related Line Depts. and headed by the Chief Secretary, 

District level:

District Disaster Management Authority headed by the District Magistrate as the Chairperson, Sabhadhipati of Zilla Parishad as CoChairperson and SP, CMOH, Exe. Engineer of I&W, SDOs and ADM in charge of D M as members

•Sub-Divisional level: Sub-Divisional level Disaster Management

Committee headed by the SDO with sub-division level officials of the Line Depts.,Municipal Chairman, BDO, as Members and SDRO/OC, Relief as the convenor.

•Block level: Block level Disaster Management Committee headed by

the Sabhapati of Panchayat Samity with the Block Development Officer as the Convener and Block level officials of the Line Depts. as Members.

•Gram Panchayat level: Gram Panchayat Disaster Management Committee headed by the Prodhan of the Gram Panchyat with tagged officials of the BDO’s office/Line Depts..

•Gram Sansad level: Gram Sansad Disaster Management Committee headed by the elected representative and villagers



State level Disaster Management Committee: Meets twice to review preparedness – April for premonsoon and August for post-monsoon under the Chairmanship of the Chief Secretary, where concern Departments represented by the Secretary present their respective preparedness plan (this year, the pre-monsoon meeting was held on 24th April).



District level Disaster Management Committee: Reviews preparedness of the district.

•IMD: issues warning on the impending cyclone/rainfall through- High priority telegrams to the State Govt. & the District Administration -Telecast through Doordarshan - Broadcast through AIR - Press Bulletins - Periodical warning through Satellite based CWDS - Warnings by other methods, like, Tele-communication • Local level warning: through miking • 31 Cyclone Warning Dissemination Sets are installed at offices of BDOs, SDOs, DMs, Police Stations and at Fishing harbours to issue and disseminate cyclone warnings



Executive Engineer, Irrigation & Waterways Dept. sends daily report on Water discharge, Rainfall and Level of water flow in the rivers to the CS/RS/CWC/IMD and others,



Central Water Commission sends forecast on advent of flood from its office at Salt Lake, Jalpaiguri and Durgapur to the State Govt.



IMD front office at Jalpaiguri assess and forecast rainfall, rise in water level in North Bengal rivers



DISTRICT ADMINISTRATION AND PANCHAYATI RAJ INSTITUTIONS:

dissemination of warning, identification of vulnerable areas, search and rescue, mounting relief operation, assessment of damages suffered, coordinating role, 

DISASTER MANAGEMENT DEPARTMENT:

to coordinate efforts of the State Govt., procurement and allocation of relief materials, administration of CRF, interaction with/briefing the media, interaction with GOI, 

CIVIL DEFENCE: rescue operation, to provide First Aid,



POLICE: search & rescue operation, maintenance of L&O



HEALTH: treatment, vaccination of affected people,



FOOD & CIVIL SUPPLY:

storing of food grains & POL at strategic places, rushing emergency food supply to the affected areas if situation so demands,

•PWD: restoration of road communication linkages, •POWER: restoration of power supply, •PHE: restoration of drinking water supply, public hygiene, •IRRIGATION: maintenance/repair of embankments and sea dykes, reclamation/ desalination of inundated land, notification of affected mouzas,

•ARD: supply of fodder/feed, vaccination of animals in the affected areas, •AGRICULTURE: to assess damage to crops and distribution of agri. relief, •FISHERIES: alerting/warning fishermen, to assess their damages & provide relief,

•NGOs: undertake search and rescue operations, relief operations, medical aid to affected people and animals, manage gruel/community kitchens, etc.

WARNING/COMMUNICATION & RESPONSE NET WORK Dist level Line Depts.

IMD

Dist Adm.

Zilla Parishad

Sub-div level Line Depts.

State Govt

Sub-Div Adm.

Panchayat Samiti Block level Line Depts.

Block

Gram Panchayat

GP level Line Depts.



Control room or Emergency Operation Centre at the State/District level function 24x7 during emergency



State EOC is located in the Writers' Buildings



District EOCs, particularly in the flood prone districts function 24x7 during the monsoon season



Steps taken to equip all district and some vulnerable sub divisional control rooms with modern communication equipments from the Calamity Relief Fund.

291 permanent rescue shelters exist in the State  Other permanent shelters, like, colleges, higher secondary/secondary /primary school and semigovt. buildings have been identified and documented in the District Disaster Management plans for use as temporary shelters during crisis,  More rescue shelters are being constructed under the State plan every year 

 



In all the districts, emergency helipad sites have been identified along with high land for air dropping, District Disaster Management Plan documents address of the owners of country/mechanised boats, generators, cranes, tractors, GR/MR dealers, In Darjeeling district, strategic sites have been identified and earmarked in collaboration with the defence officials, which can be used as helipads, for setting up of temporary rescue shelters and hospitals during any calamity,



Renaming of the Dept. of Relief to the Dept. of Disaster Management – with effect from 29th June, 2006



Conversion of the Relief Code of 1959 into Disaster Management Code- Amendment made to the decades old Relief Manual and will be published soon after the MIC, Dept. of Disaster Management approves it

31

Districts affected by FLOOD 

North Bengal - Cooch Behar, Jalpaiguri, Uttar Dinajpur, Dakshin Dinajpur, Malda;



South Bengal - Nadia, Howrah, Murshidabad, North 24 Parganas, South 24 Parganas,, Hooghly, Burdwan, Birbhum, Paschim Medinipur, Purba Medinipur;



Flood is scarce in Darjeeling in North Bengal and Bankura & Purulia in South Bengal

West Bengal is severely prone to flood,  Flood is caused by sudden release of water form the reservoirs located in Jharkhand and due to heavy rainfall in the upper catchments of the rivers originating in Sikkim, Bhutan,  Flood occurs any time between June and first fortnight of November  Since 1975, West Bengal has suffered 23 major floods  Since 1977, the State has suffered losses to the tune of Rs.36864.21 crores in terms of damage of houses, crops and public properties. 

Districts affected by CYCLONE 





Very high damage risk zone(v=50m/s) - Paschim Medinipur, Purba Medinipur, South 24 Parganas, North 24 Parganas, Howrah, Hooghly, part of Nadia, Burdwan and Bankura High damage risk zone(v=47m/s) major part of Nadia, Burdwan and Bankura, Murshidabad, Malda, Uttar and Dakshin Dinajpur, Jalpaiguri, Cooch Behar, Darjeeling, part of Purulia Moderate damage risk zone(v=29m/s)- major portion of Purulia

West Bengal has two cyclone seasons – premonsoon and post-monsoon cyclone during AprilMay and Nov-Dec, respectively,  Pre-monsoon cyclone, which causes wide spread hailstorm is known in the state as KALBAISHAKHI,  Average number of depressions in the Bay of Bengal resulting into cyclone during the two seasons - Pre-monsoon period – 11 Post- monsoon period - 28 





   

World Bank-supported programme for under taking long term cyclone mitigation measures in 3 coastal districts and in the city of Kolkata, Mitigation measures include construction of cyclone shelters, coastal shelter belt plantations, re-generation of mangrove plantation, construction of embankments to stop sea water inundation, construction of missing road/bridge links, Training and capacity building, Preparation of capital-intensive schemes by the Dept. of Irrigation and Waterways completed, Proposals for construction of cyclone, Proposal for augmenting the infrastructural facility of ATI for training and capacity building sent to NIDM,

     

IIT, Kharagpur has been entrusted with the task to study the threat perception of West Bengal from Cyclone and suggest: Risk scenario of the vulnerable areas, Identify reasons of Vulnerability, Recommend Short and Long term mitigation measures to be undertaken for cyclone risk management IIT, Kgp. is to give its recommendations by Sept., On the basis of the Cyclone Risk and Vulnerability Report by IIT, KGP., we will plan and implement Cyclone Risk and Crisis Management Programme for the State.



Districts affected by EARTHQUAKE Very high damage risk zone V – major part of Cooch Behar and some part of Jalpaiguri, High damage risk zone IV – remaining part of Cooch Behar and Jalpaiguri, entire Darjeeling, Uttar and Dakshin Dinajpur, major part of Malda,North 24 Parganas and South 24 Parganas Moderate damage risk zone III – remaining part of Malda, North and South 24 Parganas, Nadia, Murshidabad, Howrah, Hooghly, Bankura, Birbhum, Paschim and Purba Medinipur and slice of Purulia, Low damage risk zone II – remaining part of Purulia



    

Bengal Engineering and Science University(BESU), Jadabpur University, Durgapur Regional Engineering College and Jalpaiguri Engineering College are the designated State Resource Institutes(SRI) for imparting training on earthquake risk management technology, Faculty members of the Department of Civil Engineering of these SRIs already trained as TOT by IIT, Kharagpur, Hazard Safety Cell (HSC) constituted under PWD,Four members of HSC have been selected as faculty members to serve as the fifth SRI and are to undergo training shortly, BESU trained 80 practicing engineers already under National Programme for Capacity Building of Engineers in Earthquake Risk Management, Strengthening of HSC being made with fund received from the MHA, GoI. Terms of Reference already prepared by the HSC, Financial aid being given to the SRIs for enriching their libraries



 



Training of masons in construction of earthquake and cycloneresistant houses in rural areas conducted in the districts—4300 masons trained in construction of earthquake-resistant buildings, Awareness generation programme continuing under the Disaster Risk Management Programme Department of Municipal Affairs have amended the Municipal Act incorporating latest version of BIS Codes for construction of earthquake-resistant buildings and houses in the Municipalities, Department of Urban Development have prepared draft amendment to the West Bengal Town & Country Planning Act for the same purpose,

Districts Affected by DROUGHT Entire Purulia, part of Paschim Medinipur, Bankura and Birbhum

Rain water harvesting measures being undertaken in the disaster prone districts,  Watershed schemes and expansion of irrigation network being undertaken  Increasing off-farm employment through opportunities like collection of non-timber produce from the community forests, raising goats, carpentry etc. being taken up. 

Names of villages prone to landslide in the district of Darjeeling sent to the Geological Survey of India for analysis and to suggest measures for arresting landslides

The following important types of mass movements have been recognized : a) Slump, b) Debris slide and c) Earth-rock flows.

a)

Slump

A very good example is represented by a large slumping slope near Pagljhora (23 mile post from Siliguri). The gradual subsidence of the Hill Cart Road for a length of about 500 m have been noticed since 1966. b)

Debris Slide

The debris slides are generally of greater magnitude and are quite common.

Districts affected by EROSION

Malda, Murshidabad and Cooch Behar

45







Irrigation and Waterways Dept. along with the Zilla Parishads is responsible for maintenance of river embankments in the districts, Work of containing erosion in Malda within the jurisdiction of the Farrakka Barrage Project(FBP) is looked after by FBP authority, The districts of Malda, Murshidabad, South-24 Parganas and North 24-Parganas are the worst affected districts,

46

     



Workshop / Training Programme are being Conducted at ATI Training of the State Nodal officers, NGOs, District Master Trainers team completed, Consultation with resource units on development of different types of manuals, Development of Information Education Communication (IEC) completed, Orientation of the District Nodal officers and NGOs completed, Five Training Manuals, viz.,Block Disaster Management Training Manual, GP Disaster Management Training Manual, GS Disaster Management Training Manual, Guidelines for preparing Community Based Disaster Preparedness Plan, Monograph on Flood Management, published, Preparation of Disaster Management Plans • State Disaster Management Plan developed in 2003, being revised now by Jadavpur University, • District Disaster Management Plans developed and are updated every year • District Disaster Management Committees have been constituted in 10 programme districts, • Formation of Disaster management Committees: Block Disaster Management Committee formed in 194 programme Blocks 47

• • •

•

• • •

Gram Panchayat (GP) Disaster management Committees formed in 1921 GPs out of 1921 GPs IDRN portal taken up in all the districts and is updated, Disaster Management Plans prepared in 25676 Gram Sansads, 1910 Gram Panchayats, 80 municipalities,194 Blocks, and 18 Districts 357 members of 10 DDMCs, 5668 members of 194 BDMCs, 39943 members of 1921 GPDMCs, 2202 members of 79 Urban Local Body DMCs and 270065 members of 447 GSDMCs trained in disaster management 3591 members at district level, 5886 at block level, 23290 at GP level and 159932 at GS level trained on First Aid 16970 teachers at district level trained on disaster management 7116 elected members of the three-tier Panchayat Raj Institution at block level trained .

48

30,000 pieces of clothing, 38000 pieces of cotton blanket, 11000 pieces of tarpaulin sheets and 1 MT milk powder worth Rs 1.84 crs. were despatched to Orissa in 1999 after the Super Cyclone,  50,000 pieces of tarpaulin sheet worth Rs. 85 lakhs were sent to Gujrat in 2001 after the Bhuj Earthquake  42,000 pieces of tarpaulin,20,000 food packets, 10,000 Sal poles, generators, electric appliances, etc., worth Rs. 2.24 crs. were sent to the A&N islands for post-Tsunami reconstruction,  The State Government also coordinated the rescue and relief works for Andaman & Nicobar Islands through the Netaji Subhas International Airport, Kolkata Port and Howrah Railway Station,  Rs.1.00 crore was contributed to the J&K Chief Minister’s Relief Fund along with 20,000 pieces of tarpaulin sheets, worth Rs.94.40 lakhs.  50,000 pieces tarpaulin sheets were sent to Bihar in recent flood. 