Civic body to develop data back-up site

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) plans to set-up a disaster recovery site to serve as a back up of all-important civic data, in case of any emergency.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) plans to set-up a disaster recovery site to serve as a back up of all-important civic data, in case of any emergency.

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This site is expected to be operational from next year.

This standard business practice, which is being increasingly followed by private enterprises and local authorities, ensures that data of essential services for instance property tax collections or emergency data like evacuation routes is not lost in a natural or man-made calamity.

If the island city gets inundated by floods that damage important databases, then the civic authorities can log on to the back up disaster recovery site and keep essential civic services on track.

All the civic body data, which includes evacuation routes, emergency phone numbers, flood prone spots, contour maps of the city, detailed road and water networks, besides data on birth and death, property tax collections, staff details will be saved on a back up site.

A provision of Rs5 crore has been kept aside for this purpose in this year’s budget.

Civic officials said that ideally the disaster recovery site should be in another seismic zone. They are considering several options like Hyderabad, Pune and Chennai.

Most of the recovery sites across the country are located in Hyderabad. “A private firm will be hired to prepare this back up site for the BMC,” a senior civic official said, requesting anonymity as he is not authorised to talk to the media.

The municipal corporation has its disaster data centre at Worli where all records about disaster are maintained. An official from the information technology department, requesting anonymity, said, for a city like Mumbai, which is prone to calamities and disasters, it is very important to have a disaster recovery site so that if a disaster data is lost due to unavoidable circumstances, a backup is available ready-made.