Nagaland State Disaster Management Authority (NSDMA), home department, would be conducting a state wide mega mock drill of Nagaland Emergency Preparedness Exercise (NEPEx) on April 26, 2018 to test the capability of the government of Nagaland to respond to and manage disaster. The drill would be conducted in collaboration with the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA).

In this regard, a review meeting on NEPEx was held at ATI Kohima on Wednesday organized by Home department in collaboration with NDMA.

Delivering the keynote address at the review meeting, Home commissioner, Abhishek Singh, said the natural calamity was beyond anybody’s control, adding that everyone had to be prepared and play their own role.

 

Nagaland being under Zone V of earthquake prone areas, Singh said the State needed to be prepared. He said disaster alone did not cause loss of life and property but the prime reason was because of how unprepared the people were and also because of how poorly the buildings were constructed.

Citing an example, Singh said due to the rampant expansion in Kohima district it was difficult for the rescue teams to reach the victims. He, therefore, said that the only way to prevent and reduce the loss of life and property was to conduct mock drills and impart basic awareness to everyone. Singh said that disaster management should not be confined to the departments and offices alone, but must be available on websites and should be accessible to everyone. He suggested that short videos on prevention of earthquakes, fire, flood etc. should be created and shared on channels like youtube and whastapp. NDMA with the support of the Nagaland government and the media could work together in reaching out to the citizens, Singh said and expressed hope that the proposed mock drill would be a success in preventing future disasters.

In his opening remark, joint advisor (ops) NDMA, Dhirendra Singh Sindhu, said that the main objective of the mega mock exercise was to test the adequacy and efficacy of the emergency response plans of the state and district against disasters. He also highlighted the roles and responsibilities of stakeholders at the State and District level as per IRS. Sindhu asserted that the exercise was to enhance coordination and synergize efforts of various emergency support functions of the state and district and to find gaps in the resources, manpower, equipment, communication and systems.

On the scope of the mock exercise, he said it would be restricted to planning and response at the state and district level with additional assistance from central government resources.

Further, he informed that a multi-State mock drill exercise on earthquake disaster would be held simultaneously in all districts of Nagaland, Manipur, Tripura and Mizoram involving all stakeholders. He stated that the state level mock exercise would be staged from the scenario of Shillong Earthquake of 1897. In his address, OSD NDMA, Johnny Ruangmei, shared some of the key objections with review and de-briefing of NEPEx 2017. He said that during mock drill, conducted last year, the siren could be heard in many places creating confusion for many officials and participants. In this regard, Johnny suggested placing proper and permanent sirens in the form of loud speaker in strategic locations in future for early warning even in times of actual disaster.

DGP Nagaland, Rupin Sharma, also highlighted the roles of different section of Incident Response System (IRS).

ATI deputy director, Dr. Hovital Sothu, gave an insight on the structure of Incident Response System (IRS). The programme was chaired by dy. commandant general (Home Guards & Civil Defence) Nagaland, Medozhalie Pienyu. The discussion and demobilization was moderated by Khrolou Lohe, STCBO NSADMA.

Source : Nagaland Post