By Dr Arvind Kumar
The havoc wrought by the natural calamity in Leh area of Ladakh in J&K has claimed heavy toll in terms of loss of human life and destruction of property. The flash floods due to sudden cloudburst have proved instrumental in flooding Leh town and the surrounding villages, the main population centres of this thinly peopled district and also the focus of much of its economic activity. It is going to be a gigantic task for the local administration, state government as well as the Centre to restore normalcy in this remote corner of India. The following lessons can be drawn from the Leh Tragedy:
1. Need for installing Early Warning System in such tragedy-prone areas;
2. Storage facilities for emergency relief measures like medicine, packed food, etc;
3. Better convergence between the local administration, state government and Armed Forces;
4. Establishment of State Disaster Management Authority;
5. Activating the National Disaster Management Authority which is still in evolving stage;
6. Need for Inter-Sectoral convergence between various ministries of the Centre;
7. Urgency for better convergence between the Centre and tragedy-prone states;
8. Generating awareness among the people about such calamities with the help of civil societies;
9. Making the native people aware about maintaining ecological equilibrium.
