Advocating a need to strengthen the disaster management set up in the city, a parliamentary committee has recommended SWOT (strengths, weakness, opportunities and threats) analysis of disaster management set up in the Union Territory of Chandigarh.
A Department-related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs in its report on “disaster management in the country”, has stated that the UT Administration should review its disaster management set up from time to time and should undertake SWOT analysis of its disaster management set up.
The report stated, “UT Administration has not provided SWOT analysis, however, the UT has informed that these can be controlled with the existing mechanism.”The SWOT analysis is an in-depth study of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in a set up/sector.
The existing legal framework in UT Administration consists of State Disaster Management Authority (SDMA) under the chairmanship of Advisor to Administrator and District Disaster Management Committee (DDMC) under the chairmanship of Deputy Commissioner-cum-District Relief Commissioner.
The report stated, “The Union Territory of Chandigarh is a compact area limited to 114 sq. km and the present legal frame work is sufficient to tackle any disaster in future. No major disaster has taken place in the UT during the last five years. The present infrastructure available in UT Administration to strengthen Disaster Management Mechanism is adequate and satisfactory to meet any type of contingent situation.”
Notably, the UT Administration had finalized its disaster management plan last year. The plan involves hazard analysis, critical facilities analysis, disaster management strategy, long term response plan among other features.
The parliamentary Committee is of the view that UT needs capacity building and awareness generation programmes. It also requires effective mitigation measures to be built in its developmental process and be vigilant to safeguard its territorial/geographical interests.
last year, a mega exercise replicating an earthquake at Chandigarh and adjoining region was organised in February by National Disaster Management Authoriy (NDMA). The exercise was based on a hypothetical earthquake with epicentre at Sundarnagar in Mandi district of Himachal Pradesh with a magnitude of 8.0, maximum intensity of IX+, depth of 15 km and rupture length of 200 km.
From poor emergency response services to inefficient communication system, a number of shortcomings in the preparedness for a natural disaster like earthquake were observed in Chandigarh by NDMA during the mock exercise.
In Chandigarh, the mock drill was conducted at 15 locations including Deluxe Building UT Secretariat Sector 9, Plaza near Neelam Theatre Sector 17, Chandigarh Airport, Chandigarh Railway Station, ISBT Sector 43, Government Senior Secondary Model School Sector 35, Chandigarh Railway Station among others places.
As several parts of the region lies in the seismic zone IV or V making them extremely vulnerable to earthquakes, the NDMA had also released a data presenting a picture of what could happen to the UT Chandigarh and neighboring states in case of VII to X magnitude earthquake.
According to the estimations of the NDMA, 10.5 lakh population of UT Chandigarh, 74.3 lakh population of Punjab, 57.7 lakh population of HP and 47.9 lakh population of Haryana would be affected in case of an earthquake with intensity IX to X in the region.