Disaster management: Samiyar Pettai shows the way for other villages

Amidst the ruins caused by Sunday's tsunami, a small fishing hamlet in Cuddalore district is getting noticed for all the right reasons.

Though the tsunami devastated the catamarans, fishing boats and huts in Samiyar Pettai village, the number of people who died remained comparatively small at 30. Officials are attributing it to the training given to the villagers on disaster management.

The United Nations Development Project-funded 'Disaster Management and Mitigation Awareness Programme', which was being implemented in Samiyar Pettai, seems to have paid dividends as the villagers took precautionary measures after sensing early signals of the tsunamis on Sunday morning.

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The coastal district is identified as being vulnerable to earthquakes, cyclones, floods and even drought.

"Cuddalore is one of the seven districts identified as a multi-hazard prone area," said Assistant District Collector Anu George.

"We have been training the villagers in Samiyar Pettai on various measures to be taken in the event of the disaster," she said. This included forming a group of villagers, who would take care of specialised activities such as rescue operations. Another group would take care of food and other provisions and a third would keep the list of nearest phones, vehicles etc.

"We had conducted mock drills with the Samiyar Pettai villagers. The training seems to have worked, at least in a small measure, to reduce the number of deaths," Anu said.

Villagers too attributed the lower death to the training on disaster management.

"Fire force officials were here to train us on the precautions to be taken during floods and cyclones," said Kannan, a fishermen in Samiyar Pettai. "My wife and kids are safe, thanks to the training," he said.

However, the fact that the fishermen could not save their boats or fishing nets in the calamity was an eye-opener for the district administration.

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"We were not expecting a disaster of this nature. Now we are concentrating on long-term measures to rebuild the villagers' lives," said the assistant collector.

The district administration is also planning to expand the scope of UNDP project to other areas in the district after the relief and rehabilitation work, now in progress, ends. Hundreds of villagers of Puthukoopam and Parangipettai, near Samiyar Pettai, were killed by the tsunamis.

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