Prateek Dixit Blog!!: Disaster in Uttarakhand "Himalayan Tragedy"

Prateek Dixit Blog!!: Disaster in Uttarakhand "Himalayan Tragedy": With happiness, greenery, crops and many thing, Rain brings disaster and loss too. Though it is a natural phenomenon, but humans are direc...

#5 Disaster in Uttarakhand "Himalayan Tragedy"

With happiness, greenery, crops and many thing, Rain brings disaster and loss too. Though it is a natural phenomenon, but humans are directly responsible for own damage. World is facing this problem, since earth started transforming from green place to concrete jungle. Rain is a  natural cycle event, but nowadays water is seeking place to store itself, but where is the place? Development is need for huge population, but care of environment should not be masked. Global warming also plays an important role to turmoil the situation at extent.
Rainy season is the time in India in which large no. of people visit holy places in the northern states, mainly in Uttarakhand. This regions are called Himalayan region due to presence of Great Himalayan range. People full of reverence go in hilly state in large numbers. Landslides, flood and cloudburst are common here due to its geography. Chances of damage increases because of it. This year monsoon arrived some days before its routine, and caused second biggest natural disaster in India after Tsunami.
Official death toll reaches up to 1000 and more than 3000 are missing. But official figures are always less as compared to original figures. The state government was so ill prepared to handle the situation, resulting big loss. The people living there, are equally responsible for calamity. To earn money in this peak holy time, they do so many illegal construction near the river. The construction there are not well planned according to geographical location. The unplanned construction of several dams over rivers, make weaken the mountains. This lack of preparedness and planning will make state more vulnerable to disaster in future.
National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) failed in his job to make a stand. But Thanks to Army, IAF, ITBP, NDRF for their collaborative evacuation of more than 1 lakh people from various places in the state, and this became world largest rescue operation. Though an unsolicited chopper crash has happened in which 20 people killed. And almost after 15 days, the  evacuation operation has succeed on 02/07/13(Tuesday).
The main problem what the local people are facing now is the restoration of what they had lost. This is major task in front of the authorities and state govt. Despite of all this, Govt should find remedy about the future, which includes proper construction, environmental care, disaster management and a regulatory body who maintains the accounts of expenditure provided for relief and development purpose. Increase in the no. of visitors in rainy season is matter to worry. Because nowadays people visit there to spend holidays. Every year increment in the number of SUVs instead of public transport worsen the situation.
The Uttarakhand high court had passed an order asking the state government to demolish structures that come within 200 meters of the river banks. But the administration did not act. When the floods came, many of those illegal structures got demolished anyway. This happened because the nature does not accept bribe and always find their way. We should understand this.

- Prateek Dixit