NAME OF THE PARTICIPANT:Satish Kumar Gupta
GROUP: C
COMMUNITY:Keshav Puram, AshokaPark, Punjabi Bagh and Tri Nagar areas of DELHI
END COURSE PROJECT
1) Introduction
West Delhi forms an indispensable part of Delhi. My communityincludes regions of Keshav Puram, Punjabi Bagh, Tri Nagar and AshokaPark. Most of the area under the western part of Delhiis residential area. However my community also comprises of several renowned hospitals, banking facilities, schools and market places.
The area marked with Black shows the region of my community in West Delhi.
STATISTICS OF COMMUNITY:
- DEMOGRAPHIC:
Size: 11 sq. km
Population: 4.3 lakh
Location: My community lies in the western part ofDelhi.
Gender distribution: 830 females per 1000 males (2001 census)
- SOCIO-ECONOMIC:
Literacy rate: 83.24%
Economic activities: The presence of many renowned hospitals, banks, ATM centers and schools make private sector as the dominant economic activity in the region. However some Government institutions like MCD schools, and government schools make for the public sector involvement.
- PHYSICAL DATA:
Assets: Hospitals, Schools, Banks, Private Clinics, Market places, Malls and multiplexes are the major assets. The phase II (under construction) and phase I of the Metro cover the regions of my community. Besides, the community is well linked via roadways and the Rohtak Roadwhich passes through the region.
Assets endangered to natural hazards:Besides the residential areas, the institutions like hospitals, schools, banks etc. in my community are endangered to natural hazards. This is because of non-adherence to safe construction practices and building bye-laws.
My community has an extreme climate. The cold season begins in November. After the middle of March, the weather begins to turn warm and soon it becomes so hot that from April to June one experiences extreme heat when the temperature climbs to 45oC at times. The monsoon arrives towards the end of June. My community has a rainy season in winters also.
The regions of my community have a uniform geography.
2) Hazard and Vulnerability Assessments and Factors Determining the Community’s Coping Capacity
l.Hazard and Vulnerability Assessment
- HAZARD ASSESSMENT
Earthquakes are the most frequent hazard in the community. The region of my community falls in zone IV of seismic zoning map of India. The zone has fairly high Seismicity with general occurrence of earthquakes of 5-6 on the Richter scale. Major Earthquakes have occurred in 1803, 1819, 1905, 1934, 1937, 1945, 1949, 1958, 1960, 1966, 1975, 1980, 1994 during which intensities between 7 and 9 are believed to have been experienced. During recent times the area has been shocked by a number of earthquakes.Normal depth of 30 km may be assumed for these earthquakes.
Epidemicslike cholera, gastro-enteritis, hepatitis and malaria manifest themselves in the monsoons i.e. the rainy seasons. However in recent times, my community has been under the threat of fatal diseases like Dengue, Meningitis and Bird Flu. The condition was worse in the year 2006, so much so that almost all the hospitals and nursing homes were occupied with patients suffering from Dengue.
Floods can occur in my community because of the DrainageCanal that passes through the region. 20 years back, a flood is known to have occurred in the canal which caused loss of property and truncation of the road transport in the community.The region is characterized by a high area under impervious surfaces (Roads, pavements, houses etc).
- VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT
The physical vulnerability of my community arises due to the fact that the buildings have not been constructed adequately, i.e. any earthquake with magnitude more than 5 can cause severe damage to property and infrastructure in the region.
The Hospitalsbeing the most important asset of a community need to be earthquake resistant at least. However in my community most hospitals and private clinics are not so, hence making the community vulnerable and also helpless in post-disaster consequences.
The schools, not being resilient, pose a great threat as any hazard can harm the children.
My community is socially very cohesive and culturally diverse. There is mutual understanding between the people. Moreover Keshav Puram and Punjabi Bagh being mainly residential areas have people of different cultures living in one community with compassion. However the area of Tri Nagar has mainly people from the Gujar community, which recently caused a lot of tension due to strikes and killings of people in order that their community is included in the scheduled caste quota.
ll. Socio-economic factors affecting vulnerability
My community is largely a residential hub. However, Punjabi families dominate the localities such as Punjabi Bagh, Gujar and Agrawal families dominate Tri Nagar, while Keshav Puram consists of people belonging to various cultures and communities.
The economic condition varies in my community. While the area of Punjabi Bagh has wealthy families with high income groups owing to business class families over there, the areas of Keshav Puram and AshokaPark have people with Middle income groups. Kanhaiya Nagar, due to the presence of mostly markets and industries has Low income groups over there.Hence the standard of living of the people varies in my community with different sub regions.
lll Assets and access to resources for reducing vulnerability
There are some very popular commercial establishments in and around the region. To name a few, there is Big Bazar and Metro Mall at the metro station of inderlok. There are business hubs at Punjabi Bagh and Keshav Puram. The Tri Nagar market witnesses good turn around of people from all parts of Delhi.There are many renowned Hospitals and Banks in my community too.Hospitals: MaharajaAgrasenHospital, MGS hospital, Shri Atma Ram Polyclinic, And various other private clinics, CGHS Dispensaries
Schools: Hans Raj Model School, NC Jindal Public School, TyagiPublic School, BloomingBudsSr. Sec.School, MCD schools and Government schools
Banks:PNB, HDFC Bank, UTI Bank etc.
3) Design of Community Preparedness Plan
l. Organizing the process and identifying/assigning the roles within your community
Community participation has been recognized as the additional element in disaster management necessary to reverse the worldwide trend of increasing frequency and loss from disasters, build a culture of safety and disaster resilient communities, and ensure sustainable development for all.
The process and requisites for risk reduction and resource allocation can be:
-Community Risk Assessment - participatory assessment of hazards, vulnerabilities, capacities and people’s perception of risks. The community will review and analyze pastdisasters and prioritizing disasters based on its frequency and estimated losses. The lossincurred in earlier disasters is estimated and best practices carried out are discussed. Thisforms the basis for preparedness and mitigation plans. The seasonality of disasters is also analyzed.
-Formulation of Initial Disaster Risk Reduction Plan - community counter disaster,
disaster management, development plan or action plan; identification of appropriate mitigation and preparedness measures including public awareness, training and education
- Implementation of short-, medium-, and long-term risk reduction measures, activities, projects and programs - implementation strategies and mechanisms
-Monitoring and Evaluation - continuous improvement of disaster risk reduction plan/community counter disaster plan, identification of success factors and improvement of weak areas; documentation and dissemination of good practices for replication
-Organizing Disaster Management Teams- The Specific teams for response willbe identified among the young volunteers/school students for immediate responseduring a disaster.
ll. Community response plan
After forming the groups and assessing the risks, the activities duringthe next Earthquake will be planned by the community in the form of a Response Plan. The plan must be clear and compact and identify the responsibilities of all the people. The Plan should have cleardivision of roles with the responsibility of the following activities:
1.Early Warning: A team, preferably possessing radios, televisions and telephones for communication should be identified for this purpose, to be responsible for providingthe latest warning information. The Team would also liaison with the sub-divisional administrationfor getting the latest information. The team can develop some warning signals in consultation withthe people.
2.Inventory of Vulnerable members of the Community: The more vulnerable members like oldpeople, single women, and women headed households; physically challenged people will remain with the Disaster Management Committee, who would identify some volunteers, preferablyneighbors to assist them to evacuate on receipt of warning.
3.Evacuation & Rescue Team: larger team of young able-bodied volunteers,swimmers to assist in evacuation once the alarm for evacuation is sounded. They will pay specialattention to children, women with small children, older people, physically challenged people etc.
4.Shelter Management Team: Volunteers will be identified for shelter management toidentify the shelter and stock it with food, medicines, drinking water etc. The Team will identifyshelter locations for various groups inn accordance with the existing social norms regarding gender, caste etc.
5.Medical team: Team will be responsible for providing first aid to the community, before outside/ governmenthelp arrives. For this, they will have to prepare and continuously update an inventory of the ailing people, people with special needs etc.
lll. Community-level mitigation program
Structural
• Retrofitting of buildings in order to make them earthquake resilient.
• Improvement/Upgrading of access roads. Funding support from local and national governments or foreign funding agencies should be accessed for the project.
• Construction of water supply system using rainwater or groundwater to ensure supply of potable water in the event that the existing water sources get contaminated during disasters.
Non-structural
• Conduct of a comprehensive Information, Education Campaign in partnership with NGOs and provincial/municipal governments.
• Undertake skills development training to introduce alternative skills to the community for diversification of livelihood sources
• Request assistance from international agencies such as DFID, UNDP, CARE International and Oxfam for alternative livelihood
4) Conclusion
l. Challenges and proposed actions
The challenges:
1. Sustainability: For an effort to be sustainable over a long period of time, inculcating a
Culture of Prevention among each individual is important. It generally happens that an
effort loses its steam in few years with people moving out, new people not showing
adequate interest, financial problems, lack of facilitation etc.
2. Availability of Time: The exercises involving the community including mock drills haveto be conducted either during the night or very early in the morning as beingpredominantly agriculturists, there are no weekly holidays or recess during the day’swork. Finding an appropriate time is thus a problem.
- Networking: A CBDP succeeds with proper networking of the community with theadministration, NGOs and other community based organizations etc. Developing andmaintaining such extensive networks is a challenge for the success of a CBDP.
- Increase in urbanization leading to increase in risks and vulnerability to natural hazards
Actions:
1. Regular Sensitization Camps: An intensive mass awareness campaign is required throughall the media available for sensitization.
2. Training & CapacityBuilding: Regular training and capacity building programmes arerequired.
3. Sensitization of the elected representatives and policy makers for providing a techno-legalsupport in the form of building bye-laws etc.
4. Women & Children focused programs: will enable the vulnerable sections to beproactive in preparedness and take the message to the rest of the community.
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