Secretary Disaster Management Relief, Rehabilitation and Reconstruction (DMRRR), Farooq Ahmad Shah, today directed the Deputy Commissioners to work on war-footing basis for establishing dedicated Emergency Operation Centers (EOC) in every district of the State to coup with any kind of natural calamities.He passed these directions while reviewing the District Level Disaster Management Action Plan submitted by the Deputy Commissioners of Kashmir Division including Kargil and Leh districts.The meeting was attended by the Deputy Commissioners and ADCs of the Kashmir Division through video conferencing. Officers of Disaster Management Department were also present in the meeting.Addressing the DCs, Shah said that EOCs need to be equipped with latest gadgets and equipment including boats, De-watering pumps, JCBs, Life Jackets, First Aid kits etc. He also called for ensuring a proper communication system to carry rescue operations in case of emergencies and asked to provide satellite phones at these EOCs to establish contact with all field functionaries.He also directed those Deputy Commissioners who have not yet submitted Action Plan to submit immediately as per latest techniques so that funds can be released at an earliest. Funds will be provided as per SDRF norms.He asked Deputy Commissioners to identify accident prone and heavy snow fall areas in their respective districts so that they can keep available Critical Care Ambulances at their disposal so that common people can benefited.It was informed that State Executive Committee (SEC) of SDMA has already released Rs 5.50 Crore each to be kept at the disposal of Deputy Commissioners to meet expenses on account of any emergent situation arising in the district as per SDRF norms.
Further, Shah said that Rs 10 Crore have also been kept at the disposal of Deputy Commissioners as an immediate measure for disbursement of cash relief among the affectees as per SDRF norms.He also asked the Deputy Commissioners to regularly assess the level of disaster preparedness in their respective districts and emphasized on conducting mock drills to check the level of preparation, coordination and response in handling any natural disasters.Later, Shah held another video conference meeting with Member, National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), Kamal Kishore.The meeting reviewed the progress in implementation of the scheme for ‘Training of Community Volunteers in Disaster Response’ in selected 30 most flood prone districts of India (Aapda Mitra) in which J&K is one of the State.Meeting also discussed progress in implementation of the projects of National School Safety Programme (NSSP) and Sustainable Reduction in Disaster Risk (SRDR) in 10 multi-hazard prone districts of 5 States of India.The meeting was informed that under Training of community volunteers in disaster response (Aapda Mitra) Rs. 22.70 lakhs has been released to J&K out of 45. 40 lakh so far. Released funds were spent on Printing of training Module, Training of volunteers, purchase of Emergency responder Kits and Augmentation of stockpiles at Block/District level. The Secretary thanked the members of NDMA for support to J&K State.