--- Paul Henry Thiry d’Holbach.

Disasters are either natural, such as earthquakes, floods, droughts, cyclones, and landslides, or human made such as riots, conflicts (like ethnic) and others like fire, epidemics, industrial accidents and environmental fallouts (like heat and cold waves).

People and societies are becoming more vulnerable to natural disasters due to their own activities that lead to increasing poverty, population growth and density (in urban context), environmental degradation and climate change.

Globally, natural disasters account for nearly 80% of all disasters affected people. Between 1988 and 1997 natural disasters claimed an estimated 50,000 lives a year and caused damage valued at more than $60 billion a year. The latest World Disaster Report, 2003 reports that there is an increase in weather related disasters—from 200 average per year during 1993-1997 to 331 average per year during 1998-2002. Poverty and lagging development amplify the adverse effects of natural disasters. Developing countries are particularly vulnerable, because they have limited capacity to prevent and absorb these effects.

North Eastern India is a vast landmass of 2,62,179 sq km with 98% of its boundaries as International and only 2% as national. The region consists of eastern part of great Himalayan arc comprising the whole of Arunachal Pradesh, and the eastern hill ranges comprising of the Patkai-Manipur-Mizoram-Arakan-Chittagaon hill tracts and the Shillong-Mikir plateau. Dominating the geography of the region is the Brahmaputra river providing the largest drainage network in the entire eastern region of the country. Its 1,94,413 sq km drainage lies in the States of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Nagaland, Meghalaya, Sikkim and West Bengal. The Barak basin with drainage area of 26,123 sq.km lies in the States of Meghalaya, Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura, and Assam. The region experiences excessive rainfall and severe floods in the monsoon season. Floods in the region are caused by a combination of natural and anthropogenic factors. The unique geo-environmental setting of the region vis-à-vis the eastern Himalayas, heavy rainfall, weak geological formation, active seismicity, accelerated rates of erosion, rapid channel congestion, massive deforestation, intense land use pressure and high population growth especially in the flood plain belt and temporary palliative measures for flood control are some of the dominant factors that cause and intensify floods. Due to unplanned exploitation of resources, coupled with the above-mentioned factors, the region is crippled with problems such as food deficiency, energy shortage, inadequate surface communication, flood drainage congestion and declining productivity. The fragile hills are subjected to high rainfall and seismic activities, which trigger soil erosion and landslides. The average soil erosion in the region is about 28ton/ha/year.

Seismically, the NE region is one of the most active regions of the world. The earthquakes of 1897 (8.7) and 1950 (8.5) are estimated to be largest in the world. However, the present population has almost forgotten or unaware about the seismic risk of the area. Few remember that Sadiya, once a thriving city in Assam was completely destroyed by 1950 earthquake. Most of the hill cities like Itanagar, Aizwal are the recent additions in the region without any clue about the earthquake vulnerability. It would be worthwhile to note that the growth in cities are enormous and hap hazardous in this region. Almost 50% in Mizoram, 24% in Manipur, 20% in Arunachal Pradesh, 20% in Meghalaya, 18% in Nagaland, 17% in Tripura, 13% in Assam and 11% in Sikkim are urban people. Some of the States are having building bye laws (like Assam), but some have not even framed it (like Arunachal Pradesh). But the mushrooming of multi storied concrete structures with scant regard to the safety norms is characteristic of 253 cities of the region. In most of the hill cities, open plain space is not visible, which will cause hindrance during any relief work. Another alarming situation is that the traditional houses are being replaced with the concrete houses even in rural areas of the region making the population much more vulnerable to earthquake.

---- Native American proverb.

Floods have caused regular losses in the region. Every year lakhs of population, livestock and thousands of crores of property gets affected due to floods on routine basis. Brahmaputra basin flood is known all over the world. The flood warning system in the region is inadequate. The coordination with the neighboring State Arunachal Pradesh for flood report is poor. Flashfloods in the hilly region has caused damage time and again. The phenomena of cloudburst are also common in the region. Landslides have affected the habitation and the infrastructure every year. Sitting on the highest seismic zone in the unplanned urban areas, the vulnerability is maximum. The complex ethnicity of the region, the continuing insurgency, the influx of refugees, the high migration from hills to cities coupled with low level of development presents a gloomy picture of the whole NE region. Almost 40% of the population is below poverty line in the region and any disaster pushes them further below.

All these situations make the region much more vulnerable to any disaster. It is a known fact that the region gets more per capita funding than that of other parts of the country. But economic development is repeatedly interrupted or threatened by disasters, which can cause sharp increases in poverty and slow the pace of human development. While natural disasters hurt everyone affected by them, poor families are hit particularly hard because injury, disability and loss of life directly affect their main asset, their labour. The destruction of infrastructure by catastrophic natural disasters derails the development and induces the second-round poverty effects. The need to replace damaged infrastructure in disaster-stricken region diverts government resources from longer-term development objectives.

-Henry David Thoreau

The human made disasters require different platform to attend to it, may be political or administrative. However, enhancing the socio-economic capabilities of the people can minimize its affect. In this exercise, we have restricted ourselves to the management of natural disasters only.

Cumulative experience with natural disasters points to an urgent need to move from fatalism to prevention, from response to preparation, from mobilizing resources after the fact to reducing and transferring risk before the fact. Disaster reduction and mitigation can lessen the disruption caused by natural disasters, save lives, and protect property. From a purely economic point of view, investing in risk reduction pays of.

Disasters are a shared reality—spanning individual, village, block, district, state, region, nation and even international – and have to be responded to with a multi-prong approach.

The United Nations observed last decade (90s) as the decade for International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction. The International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) has identified four objectives as tools towards reaching disaster reduction for all:

By integrating disaster reduction measures into long-term sustainable development planning and action, people’s lives of today and tomorrow have the best chance of functioning without being disrupted or compromised by a natural disaster.

Disaster reduction has traditionally been described as disaster preparedness, mitigation and prevention:

Disaster preparedness involves measures taken in advance that prepare a society for an oncoming disaster through early warning systems and evacuation infrastructures.

Disaster prevention involves avoiding a disaster entirely through advanced planning, such as refraining from building in disaster prone areas.

In India ‘disaster’ is a state subject. In general, it used to be restricted to relief and rehabilitation. And, at the central level, it was monitored by Ministry of Agriculture. With the transfer of disaster management related work to the Ministry of Home Affairs, there has been a paradigm shift in focus from response and relief to pre-disaster aspects such as preparedness, mitigation, development of human resources etc. The Government of India – United Nations Development Programme (GOI-UNDP) Disaster Risk Management programme (2002-2007) has been initiated in all the eight States of the North Eastern region along with other disaster prone States of the country. All the States have already entered into Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for its implementation. The overall goal of the programme is "Sustainable reduction in Disaster Risk in hazard prone districts of selected States". Its objectives are:

Simultaneously, Government of India has launched Indian Disaster Resource Network (IDRN), which will enable the State Governments to take a stock of inventory of resources at the district level to handle any kind of impending disaster.

The geo-political situation of the region warrants a common platform in addressing the issue of Disaster Management in the North East. The isolated effort of any State in the region will not bring the desired results. Viewing this and other factors, Government of India has identified North Eastern Council (NEC) as the focal point for Disaster Management Initiatives in the NE, as well as the nodal agency for all initiatives of the Ministry of Home Affairs and its Disaster Risk Management programme. NEC will provide a platform for experience sharing, knowledge dissemination, awareness campaign and technical support to all its member States. It will help in bridging the gap exists between two or more States.

In this background, NEC has worked out following framework for disaster management in the North Eastern region:

Source materials: MHA/UNDP/India Disaster Report/World Disaster Report 2003.