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280,000 and still counting
On a dark,
grim Sunday, 26 December 2004, as the Earth moved literally
just off Indonesia, disaster and tragedy swooped down on
India’s eastern coast, riding the crest of 30-foot high
tidal waves. Nature’s double whammy an earthquake at sea
near Sumatra, leading to tides that swept through over 2000 km
of coastlines in 12 countries in South, South-East Asia, and
on the east coast of Africa.
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Coastal
regions of these countries were affected. Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Burma, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, and Maldives in Asia. Somalia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Seychelles in Africa.
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Most affected provinces were Aceh, the Northern most province on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, and Nicobar group of islands, in the Indian island territory of Andaman and Nicobar.
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Tsunami: Tragedy as a Teacher
Thomas R. DeGregori lists out the lessons to be learned from the sea surge.
January 13, 2005
Tragedies are great teachers but unfortunately, too many people draw the wrong lessons from them. We will inevitably hear from the doomsday theologians of today, who will blame human action and modern life in general for the calamity or the magnitude of its impact. Had we only heeded the warnings of the environmental ideologues and other prophets of doom, tragedies of this magnitude could have been avoided, they will say.
However, no amount of romantic ‘living in harmony with Nature’ would have provided protection to the victims of this tsunami. Contrary to popular opinion, science, technology and modern life in general, provide an enormous amount of protection from the worst hazards of nature, protection that we too often take for granted.
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India’s Aid Mistake
Barun Mitra
The Asian Wall Street Journal, January 10, 2005
Insisting that the country had the money and the manpower to deal with the tsunami crisis by itself, New Delhi politely declined offers of international aid. That was a mistake. Relief operations should have been open to anyone interested, including foreign governments and organizations. Exposing relief operations to market forces--rather than keeping them under government control--would have maximized the chance of relief supplies being quickly delivered to where they were most desperately needed.
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In
a ready State?
Barun Mitra
The Hindustan Times, January 7, 2005
The government of India is being projected to deliver relief
and facilitate rehabilitation of those affected by the
tsunami. But how effective has it been in dealing with
'crisis' during normal times? Asks Barun Mitra.
Read
More
The
Politics of Relief
Barun Mitra
January 6, 2005
TechCentralStation.Com
The tragedy in South and South East Asia has shaken the
world...
But the response has been too slow, and politics are to blame
for that. No one will know how many thousand victims
perished either at sea, or of thirst, or for lack of medical
attention trapped beneath debris of buildings, because relief
did not reach these people in time. Politics is the number one
reason for this slow response to rescue and relief operations
when it was most needed.
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What’s
the Agenda Here?
Barun Mitra, January 3, 2005
Barun Mitra takes a look at the underlying nature of the
government’s tsunami relief operations, and asks if this
crisis is another opportunity to expand the government.
After the disaster, comes the accounting. As the body count
crosses 150,000, the Indian government scrambles to reassure
citizens that relief and rehabilitation measures are being
dealt with on a war footing.
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While we were sleeping
Barun Mitra, December 31, 2004
The tsunami tragedy has revealed one thing,
says Barun Mitra : information is the key in a
crisis.
Even as we struggle to come to terms with the
trail of death and destruction left by the sea surges that hit
our unwary shores just a day after Christmas, we need to
realise that all crises opens up new opportunities.
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Natural disaster, but avoidable tragedy
BARUN MITRA, THE ECONOMIC TIMES, November 23, 1999
The enormity of the tragedy that scarred Orissa in the aftermath of the super cyclone is yet to be assessed. But a question arises: Is nature biased against poorer people and developing countries? Even a cursory analysis of the scale of natural disasters, whether floods, earthquakes or hurricanes, would show that economically developed countries have a much greater resilience to withstand calamities and suffer far lower loss of life.
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The Asian Wall Street Journal,
November 10, 1999
NEW DELHI – Twelve days after a supercyclone hit the state f
Orissa, India is still grappling with the enormity of the
tragedy. Over 10,000 people are feared dead, and
millions of hectares of cropland damaged. Meanwhile, in
Vietnam a horrendous flood has been causing more misery.
Reading these headlines of massive casualties, it seems
natural to ask the question: Does nature discriminate against
poorer people and countries?
The answer is no, but there’s a reason it seems that way.
Even a cursory analysis of various natural disasters, whether
floods, earthquakes or hurricanes, shows that economically
developed countries are better able to withstand these same
calamities and so suffer fewer casualties (although the dollar
value of property damage is higher, as one would expect).
This is in sharp contrast to the fate of people in developing
countries, where the cost in terms of human life is enormous.
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