Kerala Floods not for the first time:
Kerala floods resurfaced after 1924 and have again caught unawares the modern technology systems boastful of their might and their superior grip. Just as the designer of the mighty ship Titanic, Sir Thomas Andrews had declared that even the God cannot sink Titanic is a mathematical certainty, so did the Kerala government stretched over the incredible God’s own country! Under the prosperity of development lie many untold stories about the rising population of the elderly to almost 12.6% of the states total population which is the highest in the country. The districts worst affected by the floods such as Ernakulum, Kottayam, Thrissur and Malappuram are also the ones with substantially higher number of elderly who are living alone in loneliness and isolation. The data on how many were able to survive the calamity is yet to surface. The above 65 population of Kerala is rising by 2.3% per annum and is likely to shake off welfare policies in old age homes, palliative or end-of-life care facilities as compared to schools, factories and other employment generation infrastructure. Now the worry is primarily about who will build them back? This and many more instances prove that the loss is irreparable for many more decades to come.
Was Kerala Prepared?
Was Kerala not prepared despite having to its credit the country’s first State Disaster Management Authority immediately after the Disaster Management Act of 2005? Since the Hyogo Declaration and its follow up by the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, Kerala was found completely lacking in even the basic preparedness that could have substantially reduced the whopping losses and damages which even by most conservative estimates currently stand beyond Rs.20,000 crores (Kerala GDP 7.73 L crore).This will increase as water recedes. Almost 12 of the 14 districts in Kerala reeled under torrential rains, crop worth 3.42 billion rupees (US$49.65 million), across 26,824 hectares had been destroyed by rains since their onset on May 29 and 31,000 people were forced to take shelter in rescue camps yet the Chief of the Kerala SDMA P.H.Kurian maintained that the rains have eased. The state’s high investment in the early warning systems was neither used nor referred to.
As the administrative machinery which was expected to do the following ie;
- map in advance the most vulnerable zones,
- streamline the most appropriate rescue operations,
- mark evacuation safety points,
- storage godowns for basic necessity foods and medicines,
- shelter platforms for animals and
- fast track GIS and meteorological possibilities of disasters through dams and landslides etc.
The administration was found having done nothing of the above. Interestingly, the early warning systems (EWS) forecasting was installed but overlooked wherever it could have been available. Both the human as well as the instrumental equipment side of the device was ill prepared.
EWS is a mechanical system where technology takes over or performs the task of appropriate identification, detection and mobilization of action. In earlier eras of human history early warnings were community generated, they came as a natural corollary to indigenous wisdom where wise community leaders could predict disasters through the movement of clouds, colours of the sky, behavior of animals and silence of trees.These leaders used to move their tribes and animals to safer places whenever they sensed possibilities of hurricanes, tornadoes or tsunamis in their regions. The grand old woman or man of the community were repositories of knowledge about ecological history and interdependence of ecosystems. This wisdom was passed down to newer generations and communities were able to maintain their resilience to disasters. As community habitats were disrupted through deforestation, mining, infrastructure expansion into wilderness zones, mobile and high frequency electromagnetic and radio waves disrupting environmental sounds from skies to the ocean bed, natural signals were obstructed, and resilience weakened. In a modern world much of the older community resource which helped them resist fatal calamities are being lost such as mangroves, bamboos, house building materials, particular tree leaves to contain forest fires or grasses to produce smoke which prevented the spread of epidemics. The community knowledge lost due to environmental degradation and land scape changes is beyond the comprehension of the current generation yet it is difficult to return to the serenity where community based EWS worked. So, the laboratory based EWS were pulled in to fill the loss. These EWS attempted to absorb as much meteorological and geospatial information which the instrument could identify and capture. These instruments obtained sophisticated ability to work through remote sensing and satellite imagery and make predictions which were the closest approximation to real threat.
Who would trust EWS Warnings?
The EWS succeeded in warning people but the trust deficit on one hand and governance deficits on the other hand failed appropriate response to the warning. This suggests that EWS can warn before the disaster but what should be done after the warning is received or ‘subsequent action’ requires a translation of this scientific information into readable and understandable warnings and alerts to be immediately transferred to the field administrative agencies. The field agencies are expected to spring into required action for preparedness, rescue and public engagement with local communities, support institutions and rehabilitation centres. Another important factor is the emphasis that EWS is a responsibility of administrative agencies towards preparedness or advance planning based on warnings on impending disasters. Say for example, if a particular zone is landslide affected and landslides occur mostly during rains then a special preparation to make communities safer should have been done in advance. As I am writing this article, India’s most scenic and most highly rated state in human development index ‘Kerala’ is reeling under devastating floods which is seen as a return of the most destructive 1924 floods in the history of the state. The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) indicated a deviation from the normal 1,606.05 mm rainfall but in a week this normal rainfall crossed an increase of 257% as per the records. Some of the most visited tourist destinations of Athirapally, Ponmudi and Munnar witnessed unprecedented destruction.The question arises why this advanced and progressive state did not have any EWS system or if it had why were they not helpful?
Warnings ignored by Administration:
Was it the deciphering of information or the intention? Kerala as the most developed state in India was systematically warned by the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) that despite its huge investment of 2.34 Crores in the LBEWS the state neglected the installations and repairs of installed EWS due to which 289 out of 351 EWSs were found non-functional. The state was also quick to install very high frequency radio based communication for enforcing an effective warning even in times when telephones and other devices of communications stop working.This was undertaken in 379 locations and the installing company Linkwell Electronic Private Ltd. was accountable for its operational maintenance. Interestingly, despite the fact that most of the instruments failed to work the government did not impose any liquidated damages on the firm but on the top of it overseeing the lapse, all balance payments were made to the firm. The CAG report also mentions that EWS failed due to administrative inability to disseminate warnings to communities and also lack of trained personnel to operate the system.
Another EWS related issue which catches attention from the Kerala story is about the knowledge system and a leadership specific to the ecosystem of each state. The state has 44 rivers and 42 dams and some dams have very high reservoir capacity. But is this knowledge enough? To decipher scientific warnings issued from laboratories one need to be grounded in the local knowledge system and may not be a transient traveler on an administrative posting. When the adjoining state of Tamil Nadu issued the first warning alert to Kerala about excess water from Periyar river’s Mullapperiyar dam likely to flow down to the Kerala’s Iduki dam, it was dismissed as unnecessary panic by the KSEB Chairman and Managing director N S Pillai as well as the overconfident Power Minister M.M.Mani. Finally they opened the gate with a huge surge of flash flood about which most people and even district administrators were caught unawares. It is also alleged by local people that the shutters of another dam of Banasursagar were opened without giving any intimation even to district authorities.
The Secretary General of the World Meteorological Organization Michael Jarraud suggests, ‘ Disaster Prevention and mitigation are essential to sustainable development…..the challenge for countries is therefore to empower each community to apply these tools optimally through networking and partnerships’. In the same gathering on Early Warning Systems the President William J.Clinton went further ahead of Jarraud to declare that ‘if we want an effective early warning systems we must work together government to government, federal to local officials, scientists with policy makers, legislators with teachers and community leaders.’[1].
Conclusion:
Therefore, EWS is just a bit of technology and largely a tool of governance which should be brought together in a network all stakeholders much prior to the disaster. This preparedness question around the use of EWSs is much dependent on the capabilities and shortcomings of administrative systems and the leader on the steering wheel. It is also clearer to ascertain that a participatory local governance can play a major role in building trust, overcoming gaps between science and non-science administrative institutions and local community institutions and this is the test which fails most governments in implementing early warnings. With this understanding the present paper looks at the nature, progress and drawbacks of EWS systems in some key areas in Asia.
