Floods being declared ‘national disaster’ would solve problem?
Kerala has been witness to the most devastating floods of the century. The last two weeks have been massive testing times for the ‘god’s own country’ with more than 300 declared dead and lakhs of people being displaced owing to torrential rains and gushing waters. PM Modi visited Kerala on Sunday for an aerial survey of the affected places and declared Rs 500 crore as interim relief. The ruling party, the opposition and the government of Kerala have together requested this to be declared a national disaster. There has been widespread support to this in social media too.
What do people expect from government when a disaster of this scale hits a state? Just an aid of Rs 500 crore? Or a tag of national disaster being associated with this devastating situation? How does that help? We had urged the central government in the past to declare Kannada a classical language. What is the situation of Kannada after that status was accorded? What impact has that status had on Kannada, its culture and its studies? No one has taken this into account after that.
The status of Kannada has remained unchanged after that. Today there is a widespread effort to impose Hindi on Kannada. In the same manner, we do have a declaration of ‘national disaster’ in circulation now. There is no legal interpretation to this word. Central government is already providing some aid and help in the form of resources to Kerala. Even if it is declared a national disaster, it would not make much of a difference to the situation right now.
The disaster management act 2000 is part of larger scheme. Even then, there is no scope to declare this a national disaster. Natural disasters cannot be classified as state, national or local ones. According to the senior expert in National Disaster Management expert Anil Gupta, managing natural disasters is the responsibility of state government. The state government can only provide aid during such situation. But the central government is vested with the power to declare a national disaster. But the state govt has to seek aid from central government for this and then the centre can act accordingly.
Though national disaster has no particular meaning to it whether legal or administrational, our politicians have been repeatedly using this word time and again without understanding its full meaning. Even when floods ravaged Gujarat, Bihar, Assam and W Bengal and Jammu and Kashmir in the past, they were not declared national disasters. PM Narendra Modi had used this term for the first time in 2014. But the death and destruction in 2017 Bihar floods was much higher than whatever happened in Jammu Kashmir is a different point altogether.
National Disaster Management Authority laid out a scheme to manage disaster in 2016. It has clearly classified the types of disasters. Any disaster that can be managed with resources at district level, it is level one type of disaster. If the state has to employ its state level resources to manage the situation, it is level 2 disaster. If the calamity is of very large scale, and the state cannot manage it, it becomes a level 3 disaster. Central government has always adapted step motherly treatment about flood relief distribution to states. In 2013, the floods that ravaged Uttarakhand and the following landslides had left 5700 people dead.
The Manmohan Singh government had then provided an aid of Rs 1,000 cr to the state. Though the number of people who died in Tamil Nadu floods was lesser than that in 2015, central government had provided almost same amount of help – Rs 939.6 cr. Now, central government is exhibiting its myopic approach in Kerala too. The centre had declared Rs 100 cr to Kerala at the initial stages of the flood. It had also said the state had enough funds in its disaster management corpus. After this was criticized widely, Modi government declared another Rs 500 crore aid for the state. Now, the centre has called this a disaster of grave nature, and is trying to pacify south Indians. Yet, one fails to understand why the centre isn’t moved by this ‘grave situation’ and proving more aid for the state.
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Rupee hits all-time low for second time in a week
Mumbai (PTI): The rupee depreciated 31 paise to settle at 91.99 against the US dollar on Wednesday, touching the lowest closing level for the second time in less than a week, amid increased month-end demand for the greenback.
Forex traders said the rupee opened higher as the US dollar index softened and a long-awaited trade breakthrough with Europe offered quiet reassurance. However, increased month-end demand for the American currency as well as the ongoing geopolitical tensions dented investors' sentiments.
At the interbank foreign exchange, the rupee opened at 91.60 and touched an early high of 91.50, but pared all the gains to touch an intra-day low of 91.99 against the greenback.
The domestic unit settled 31 paise down, revisiting its lowest-ever closing level of 91.99 against the greenback. The Indian currency previously ended at this level on January 23 when it also hit its all-time intraday low of 92 against the US dollar.
On Tuesday, the rupee rebounded from its all-time low levels and gained 22 paise to close at 91.68 against the US dollar.
Analysts said the rupee opened higher as the US dollar index softened and a long-awaited trade breakthrough with Europe bolstered investor sentiment.
India and the European Union on Tuesday announced the conclusion of negotiations for the free trade agreement (FTA), under which a number of domestic sectors such as apparel, chemicals and footwear will get duty-free entry into the 27-nation bloc, while the EU will get access to the Indian market at concessional duty for cars and wines, an official said.
The deal has been dubbed the "mother of all deals" as it will create a market of about 2 billion people.
Meanwhile, the dollar index, which gauges the greenback's strength against a basket of six currencies, was trading 0.07 per cent lower at 96.14.
Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, was trading 0.43 per cent lower at USD 67.28 per barrel in futures trade.
On the domestic equity market front, Sensex jumped 487.20 points to settle at 82,344.68, while Nifty surged 167.35 points to 25,342.75.
Foreign Institutional Investors turned net buyers and purchased equities worth Rs 480.26 crore on Wednesday, according to exchange data.
