The 2004 calamity marked the beginning of a new chapter in the lives of those who lost their homes, fish boats, and much else. Anticipatory action plans for managing the consequences of seawater intrusion in our coastal areas have become an imperative.
REITERATING its commitment to preserve the ecosystem of Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Lieutenant Governor Bhopinder Singh has said that protection of endangered species was the top priority.
With a parliamentary panel finding misutilisation and diversion of tsunami relief funds, an empowered group of ministers (e-GOM) headed by union home minister Shivraj Patil has undertaken a review of the Rs 10,000 crore rehabilitation scheme. Since 2008-09 is the deadline for implementation of the rehabilitation scheme, the e-GoM issued a directive to the affected states and union territories that the work should be expedited to complete the task within the stipulated time.
Over three years after the tsunami nearly flattened parts of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, rehabilitation work is still on. Its progress seems slower than in other parts of the country. A scene from the picturesque Bamboo Flat permanent tenements is representative of the work in the entire archipelago. Completed houses, papered with expensive bamboo patterns, stand beside blocks of cement sticking out of wet mud
R K Bhattacharya Former director, Anthropological Survey of India, and member of the Expert Committee appointed by the Calcutta High Court. In the report submitted to the court in 2003, he says:
A remarkable fact about the recent debate about Singur is that it is so much about land, and so little about cars. Yet a thousand acres of land is really not very much, given that the state has over
It is the saga of callous and pathetic implementation of relief I work and rehabilitation of the tsunami-affected. The tsunami I that hit the Indian coastline on the morning of December 26, 12004, swept away 1,089 villages, claimed over 10,273 lives I and rendered 2,39,024 families homeless. By all accounts, it was the biggest natural calamity to hit India.
THE total seasonal rainfall during the year's southwest monsoon (June 1 to September 30) for the country as a whole was 99 per cent of its long-period average (LPA), which, being within plus or minus 10 per cent of the LPA, can be termed as a `normal' monsoon.
