TITLE OF THE PROJECT

ROLE OF LOCAL SELF GOVERNMENT IN DISASTER

MANAGEMENT

Post Graduate Diploma in Disaster Management (PGDDM)

SUBMITTED BY

NAME: SYED MUNAWAR ALI

ENROLLMENT NO:2005992638
 INDEX:

S.NO TOPIC PAGE NO.

1 INTRODUCTION 3

2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM 3-4

3 INFORMATION- REVIEW OF 4-6

LITERATURE

4 OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY 6

5 RESEARCH DESIGN 6

6 PRIMARY DATA COLLECTION 7

7 SECONDARY DATA 7

COLLECTION

8 CHAPTERIZATION 7

9 CONCLUSION 8

10 REFERENCES 8-9

2
 INTRODUCTION

As everywhere in the state, disaster preparedness or mitigation does not find a place in

the Panchayat plan, and there is no budget allocation for the purpose. The resource

constraints of rural Panchayats form a major bottleneck in formulating a disaster

management plan, even in disaster prone areas with high vulnerability. Panchayats are

not in a position to take at least a reactive approach to disaster management, leave alone a

proactive approach.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Absence of space for involvement of local governments and the affected community in

the state government’s disaster management interventions was a notable factor. The lack

of delegation of authority of the Panchayats pertaining to disaster management, absence

of clear demarcation of functions related to disaster mitigation, relief and rehabilitation,

and the government’s reluctance to share relief funds with local Panchayats is major

constraints that inhibit the development of local government’s capacity for disaster

management. Despite these current limitations, the potential role of local self government

institutions in disaster management is significant and the required capacity can be

created. The delivery of relief and rehabilitation would have been far better, if they had at

least a nominal role. Beneficiary selection for housing and livelihood support are

examples. The list of beneficiaries for permanent shelters is not yet complete because the

revenue officials are not in a position to decide who really lost their houses. People who

had left the village several years ago are in the government’s list of beneficiaries where

as many fishermen families who had their dwellings on the sea shore without ‘Patta’ are

not eligible for any of the benefits including housing as there are no official records of

their residence in the village.

suffering from a series of issues both internal and external. It can be called as the ‘second

disaster’. The families who were suffering from problems such as absence of drinking

water, electricity, incomplete housing, lack of environmental hygiene, lack of space in

and outside their houses and above all non-acceptance from the outside community were

innumerable. So there is a great need to understand the awareness level of the people

about the various roles of local self government and the extent of local community’s

participation in the total disaster management programme.

INFORMATION- REVIEW OF LITERATURE

Additionally, Berke et al. (1993) emphasise the importance of maximizing external aid

during disaster recovery to establish more effective self-directed and sustainable

development initiatives within the local organisations. They also highlight the needs for

the locals to assume the role of active participants, rather than the helpless victims. In a

similar fashion, ISDR (2010) argues that local governments have crucial roles in the

disaster-recovery process as it will sustain development once the external stakeholders

leave. The collaboration between the provincial, local governments and other

stakeholders is considered very important as it may result in an effective coordination of

overlapping resources and responsibilities as well as in pooling expertise required for the

recovery.

In addition, Wolensky and Wolensky (1990) summarise that much of the focus of

disaster management has been placed on the local governments due to at least four

reasons; (i) disaster management is implemented by the local government, (ii) there is a

growing recognition that the local governments play the most active roles in emergency

operations, (ii) disaster-related expectation at the federal level is shifting towards the
subnational government, and (iv) many of the states require localities to develop

comprehensive emergency plans.

Moreover, local government is considered to be in the best position to effectively engage

local communities. Kusumasari et al., (2010) underlines that local governments play

important roles before, during and after the disaster because they know the community

very well. Haddow and Bullock (2006, cited in Col, 2007) add that “the key government

level (in case of the emergency) is the one that has relevant equipment and adequate

management capacity while still being close to the ground and in the midst of the

emergency incident." Accordingly, the key government level referred to in their

statement is the local government as the body that is closest to the emergency site and the

affected community, which is also required to provide the most immediate response

should an emergency event takes place.

ISDR (2010) denotes five key points of challenges and opportunities to consider when

attempting replication. The first is the lack of interest and capacities of the local

government. Here, the support of partner agencies such as national government, donors

and NGOs is expected to play a catalytic role to fill the initial gaps. The second is

understanding local risk and vulnerabilities. Even though it has been suggested that local

governments know their community very well, they often lack sufficient knowledge

about disaster risks and vulnerabilities of their communities as well as the required and

appropriate measures to mitigate disaster. The third key point is with regard to the

maintenance and upgrading of critical infrastructure. Whilst the local governments are

responsible for a number of critical infrastructures, the investment to make them resilient

is often not very visible, resulting in neglect and dilapidation. Fourth, managing a long-

term process is difficult. Being a long-term process, disaster risk reduction initiatives
often suffer from staff changes and unequal interest among the key decision makers.

Fifth, learning from disasters. It is argued that people are more tempted towards short-

term, visible recovery works. However, the momentum created by a disaster is often to be

a very effective time to initiate changes and to engage local governments and

communities with the long-term efforts.

OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

Following objectives are formulated for the proposed study:

 To discuss briefly the concept, meaning, type, classification and impact of the

disasters

 To study a conceptual framework of disaster management

 To analyze the role of local self government in disaster management

 To study the challenges and obstacles faced by panchayats in disaster response

programs.

RESEARCH DESIGN

Research design is a detailed outline of how an investigation will take place. A research

design will typically include how data is to be collected, what instruments will

be employed, how the instruments will be used and the intended means for analyzing data

collected.

Descriptive Research design is appropriate for this study. Descriptive study is used to

study the situation. This kind of study helps to describe the situation. A detail descriptive

about present and past situation can be found out by the descriptive study. In the

proposed study, it involves the analysis of the situation using the secondary data.
Primary data collection

In my research work I have collected data from various NGO’s, Panchayat Institutions

and Disaster affected places. I have given in the references at the end of my proposal. I

will give the places visited and actual location in the main project.

Secondary data

Books, journals, magazines, articles, newspapers and related sources on role of local

self-government in disaster management.

The data sources used will be the articles, journals, reference books and Literature

Review published by third parties but available to the public. The World Wide Web

(Internet) is also an important source of information related to Local self-government

and their role in disaster management.

Media:

I will write in detail about the media covering the subject from time to time. This will

also be mentioned in the main project.

CHAPTERIZATION:

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER II: DISASTER MANAGEMENT- A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

CHAPTER III: DISASTER MANAGEMENT AT THE LOCAL LEVEL – ROLE OF

LOCAL SELF GOVERNMENT

CHAPTER IV: SUGGESTIONS

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION

REFERENCES
CONCLUSION

India is one of the world’s major theatres of disasters. Coastal states, particularly in the

East Coast and Gujarat, are vulnerable to cyclones, 4 crore hectare land mass is

vulnerable to floods, 68 per cent of net sown area is vulnerable to drought, 55 per cent of

total area is in Seismic Zones III-V and vulnerable to earthquakes and Sub-Himalayan/

Western Ghat is vulnerable to landslides (Planning Commission, 2002). The impact of

these disasters has been devastating. Between 1988 and 1997, disasters killed on an

average 5,116 people and affected 24.79 million people in the country every year (UNDP

and National Disaster Management Division, 2002). The death toll due to natural

disasters has gone up, with about 10,000 people killed in the super cyclone of 1999, about

20,000 killed in the earthquake of 2001, and more than 11,000 in the Tsunami of 2004

(Das, 2005). If the Local Self Government is good it will decrease the vulnerability.

Panchayat Raj Institutions can also be included to reduce the vulnerability.

REFERENCES

 Asian Disaster Reduction and Response Network (ADDRN), (2007) Malesia.

 Asian Disasters Preparedness Centre, A comparative Study of Nepal and Japan”,

2-17.

 Asim Kumar Mukhopadhya (2005), Crisis and disaster Management Turbulence

and Aftermath, New Age International (P) Ltd, Publishers, New Delhi, 29-36.

 GOI (2004) Disaster Management in India: A Status Report, Natural disaster

Management Division, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India, new

Delhi.

 Jain & Polman, (2003), The Panchayati Raj model in India, FAO Regional Office

for Asia and the Pacific, Bangkok, Thailand.

22-90.

 Action Aid International, (2007), What we do: Emergencies: Tsunami disaster:

Disaster Risk Reduction in the Post- Tsunami Context, Action Aid Publication,

South Africa.

 ADPC (2004) Program Completion Report: Asian Urban Disaster Mitigation

Program. Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC). Bangkok, Thailand.

 ADPC (2004) Report of the 4th Meeting of the ADPC Regional Consultative,

Committee on Disaster Management. Dhaka, Bangladesh, March 2004. Bangkok,

Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC).