Rain ravage: Tracking infra loss

India didn't have any way to know the extent of these losses till March this year, when the DM Act of 2005 was amended to set up a 'disaster database'

- SUBHOMOY BHATTACHARJEE

When water gushes out of river channels, what is the greatest damage it can cause to infrastructure? Despite pictures of torn houses and cars, if roads, telecom towers, and power stations remain safe, the scale of loss is not more than 30 per cent of the overall infrastructure assets in the area.

In this mega monsoon season billowing over India, these are some slivers of reassuring thought, since India does not have any sequestered sum available to finance such losses. A report written by New Delhi-based Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI), a global network of countries working to make infrastructure safe, notes: "Roads and railways, telecommunications, and power and energy account for around 80 per cent of the total annual average loss of infrastructure sectors, so strengthening resilience in these sectors will generate an important dividend in most countries." The 2023 report also notes that while floods and winds damage power plants, landslides impact roads and rail networks more severely. In the current bout of rains, it is not surprising that roads have been the most affected.

Once water recedes, these will be the largest concern for the Centre and the state governments. It is pertinent that till now the country did not have any way to know the extent of these infrastructure losses. This was rectified only as late as March this year. The two-decade-old Disaster Management (DM) Act of 2005 was amended in the Budget session of Parliament to set up a "disaster database".

Safi Ahsan Rizvi, advisor (mitigation) in the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), notes that the amendments, widening definitions of disaster, will allow for larger capital works like mapping of glacier lakes and their outburst among others like prevention of landslides and urban floods.