Given the COVID-19 pandemic and approaching monsoons which lead to many disasters in the state, the Uttarakhand government has now decided that students will be taught disaster management in schools once a week.
Chief minister Trivendra Singh Rawat while taking a review meeting of the disaster management department on Saturday gave the instructions. The chief minister instructed the officers to provide training to the youth, members of Gram Sabha so as to prepare themselves and learn how to handle such situations.
“It is necessary to make people aware of disaster management given the geographical conditions of Uttarakhand. It is important to train people for incidents of fire and how to tackle with emergency situations during the rainy season. For this, mock drills should also be conducted from time to time to meet the challenges of disaster,” said Rawat.
He further said that to make the training that is being given for disaster management more effective, experts in the field should be consulted.
“Those who are authorised by the experts to train teachers across schools should start the training work for disaster management. The visual communication system should be strengthened further. Sensitive places should be identified from the point of view of disaster before monsoon sets in. Along with this, efforts should be made to minimize disaster response time and awareness campaigns informing people about the spread of Covid-19 should continue,” said Rawat.
{{/usCountry}}“Those who are authorised by the experts to train teachers across schools should start the training work for disaster management. The visual communication system should be strengthened further. Sensitive places should be identified from the point of view of disaster before monsoon sets in. Along with this, efforts should be made to minimize disaster response time and awareness campaigns informing people about the spread of Covid-19 should continue,” said Rawat.
{{/usCountry}}In the meeting, officials from the Uttarakhand State Disaster Management Authority apprised the chief minister that work was underway for installing Doppler radar in Mukteshwar and Surkanda which will give accurate information related to the weather. To strengthen the communication system, 184 satellite phones have been provided at the tehsil level across the state.
Since 2012, 699 families in 27 disaster-hit villages have been rehabilitated. Along with this, 84 earthquake early warning system devices have been installed in the Garhwal division and 100 in Kumaon division. Flood warning systems have also been installed at eight sensitive locations on the banks of Ganga from Koteshwar to Rishikesh. Officials at the state and district level have also been trained in incident response systems.