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Business Commentary/Dilip Thakore

Economy's overlords bungle in cyclone-hit Orissa

The Orissa cyclone has thoroughly exposed the utter incompetence of post-Independence India's administrators who also preside over the economy.

The supercyclone devastated Orissa on October 29. Even after one month, most of the affected villages remain marooned. Food, shelter and medical supplies are not available; cholera, typhoid and gastro-enteritis have spread.

There is no shortage of apologists for government and the government-dominated economic development model who argue that the cyclone was an act of God which would have caught any administration unawares.

Yet the facts which are emerging indicate that there was sufficient advance warning on October 26 and 27 that the cyclone was building up in the Bay of Bengal. But the effort made to warn the people most likely to be affected or to evacuate villages directly in the path of the brewing storm was pathetically inadequate.

It is ironic that viewers of national news bulletins in urban India were aware of the building storm while Orissa's desperately poor villages which are yet to experience 'miracles' such as electricity and television, were oblivious of the brewing storm.

The state's rabi crop was wiped out and property valued at Rs 10 billion destroyed. Law and order situation deteriorated as starving people resorted to the laws of the jungle.

The state's administration should have developed some disaster management skills given that cyclones and storms are not strangers to this coastal state. In 1971, 10,000 people died in a similar cyclone. Orissa boasts only 21 concrete shelters with a capacity of 2,000 each.

People in India and elsewhere have responded generously to the needs of the cyclone-affected. But government bureaucracies in India are not known for preventive measures to avoid theft and maldistribution of aid material.

The silver lining is that these calamities provide a learning opportunity to the people and the administration.

The first lesson to be learned is that the lower bureaucracy requires elementary training in customer responsiveness, civic defence and disaster management.

Since most disasters such as floods, earthquakes, dam bursts and factory explosions are foreseeable, disaster management teams should be constituted in advance and worst-case scenario drills conducted regularly.

The Orissa tragedy is also a time of introspection for India's 20 million strong, multi-tiered bureaucracy. After all, it costs the nation an estimated Rs 400 billion annually. The bureaucracy needs to earn its keep and learn the rudiments of disaster prevention and management.

Dilip Thakore

Business