Union Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation Minister M.Venkaiah Naidu on Monday released 'Earthquake Hazard Zoning Maps' to enable quake resistant construction in the country where an estimated 95 percent of households are vulnerable to earthquakes in different degrees.An initiative of the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and Building Materials Technology Promotion Council (BMPTC), the "easy to use" maps have been released at country, state and district levels and incorporate tehsil-level features.The colour coded maps easily convey location in five different Zones of earthquake intensity which helps in planning for disaster resistant construction with necessary technical assistance.Releasing the maps, Naidu stressed on the need for digitisation of these maps at the earliest and also suggested evolving a Mobile App based on these maps.
He said that the maps would be of significant help to architects, engineers, land use planners, insurance agencies and those involved in disaster mitigation and emergency planning and management.Speaking on the occasion, BMPTC Executive Director Sailesh Agarwal said that out of the 304 million households in the country, about 95 percent are vulnerable to earthquakes in different degree.The maps have been prepared using the data available with the Survey of India, Geological Survey of India, Meteorological Department and Census of India. The additional features of these maps include housing and population data, railway lines, expressways and highways, rivers, waterbodies, geological fault lines among others.