Monday, December 27, 2004
Houses Awaited Tsunami Disaster in India
We were glued to television watching the enormity of damage caused by this tsunami.
No tsunami has hit India in the recent memory. Nobody including the government agencies is trained to handle such devastation. Many lives were lost as the rescue mechanisms were not in place.
The villages I visited north of Pondicherry had all the houses up to 300 metres from the seafront washed away. The death toll in these villages was minimum as the villagers ran away on seeing rising waters. At a village Pudukkuppam near Pondicherry University, I saw water level marks on the walls of houses up to 4 feet high. These houses were located 400 metres from the shoreline.
The survived villagers pointed out the sea has risen about 15 – 25 feet on the seafront and the entire stretch of the beach was covered with rushing water and waves. The force of the tsunami was so great that all the houses were smashed and washed away, steel almariahs(cupboards) were crushed like paper bags, television sets crushed to pieces, boats tossed as far away as 500 metre, fish nets sucked away by receding waters, all belongings of the fishermen including their identity cards (ration cards), whatever savings and children school books and notebooks. Fishermen of these villages keep all their belongings including cash, jewellery, documents etc in their homes only. They lost all their belongings along with their houses.
Most of the people who lived on the beaches in huts and small houses were washed away. Since it happened on a Sunday morning children were at home or playing on the beaches lost their lives along with their parents, brothers, sisters, friends and neighbors. All the houses destroyed have been built within 200 metres from the shoreline and they were situated within 100 metres from high-tide line.
All the affected villages on the coastline were densely populated. These villages expanded over the last 50 years in all directions including eastwards on the beachfront. Entire families worked in the fishing trade, men ventured in to the sea to catch fish, women and children worked on the beaches drying fish, cleaning and mending the fish nets. Women mostly sell the fish in nearby towns and villages.
The village Nallavadu, I visited is densely populated with 165 families and 1300+ population occupying the total area of about 3.75 acres of land. This is a strange village, which is surrounded by the Pondicherry territory on all three sides and the sea on the east side. There is not even a square metre of land, which is not used up, in this tiny hamlet. The people had no choice but to expand their village eastwards on the seafront. All the houses on the beach were washed away by the tsunami. Luckily no one died in this village.
The fishermen have been granted pattas by local governments over the years for the plots and houses constructed in these villages. Pucca buildings were constructed under various schemes at these villages by government agencies. The fishermen built new houses unauthorizedly on the coastline. According to THE ENVIRONMENT (PROTECTION) ACT, 1986 (as amended up to 3rd October 2001) Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ), the CRZIII “The area up to 200 metres from the High Tide Line is to be earmarked as ‘No Development Zone’. No construction shall be permitted within this zone. It further says Construction/reconstruction of dwelling units between 200 and 500 metres of the High TideLine permitted so long it is within the ambit of traditional rights and customary uses such as existing fishing villages and gaothans. Building permission for such construction/reconstruction will be subject to the conditions that the total number of dwelling units shall not be more than twice the number of existing units; total covered area on all floors shall not exceed 33 percent of the plot size; the overall height of construction shall not exceed 9 metres and construction shall not be more than 2 floors ground floor plus one floor.”
But none of these regulations were implemented and the huts on the coastline were not regulated. The 200-500 metre limit if implemented without any violation would have saved many lives. But villages and houses up to 1km from the shoreline were effected by the recent Tsunami is only a pointer to the highest safety and precaution needed to be built in to the regulations depending on the topography of the villages and their location near sea and back waters near the sea.
This shows all rules were broken in building houses on the beaches. Fishermen villages at Cuddalore, Chidambaram, Nagapattinam are densely populated and their houses were situated literally on the high tide line on the beaches. This has resulted in heavy death toll. The government should strictly apply the CRZIII guidelines while reconstructing the houses damaged and relocate these villagers safely beyond the 500 metre limit and continue to monitor no one moves with unauthorized dwellings near the high tide line in the years ahead.
No tsunami has hit India in the recent memory. Nobody including the government agencies is trained to handle such devastation. Many lives were lost as the rescue mechanisms were not in place.
The villages I visited north of Pondicherry had all the houses up to 300 metres from the seafront washed away. The death toll in these villages was minimum as the villagers ran away on seeing rising waters. At a village Pudukkuppam near Pondicherry University, I saw water level marks on the walls of houses up to 4 feet high. These houses were located 400 metres from the shoreline.
The survived villagers pointed out the sea has risen about 15 – 25 feet on the seafront and the entire stretch of the beach was covered with rushing water and waves. The force of the tsunami was so great that all the houses were smashed and washed away, steel almariahs(cupboards) were crushed like paper bags, television sets crushed to pieces, boats tossed as far away as 500 metre, fish nets sucked away by receding waters, all belongings of the fishermen including their identity cards (ration cards), whatever savings and children school books and notebooks. Fishermen of these villages keep all their belongings including cash, jewellery, documents etc in their homes only. They lost all their belongings along with their houses.
Most of the people who lived on the beaches in huts and small houses were washed away. Since it happened on a Sunday morning children were at home or playing on the beaches lost their lives along with their parents, brothers, sisters, friends and neighbors. All the houses destroyed have been built within 200 metres from the shoreline and they were situated within 100 metres from high-tide line.
All the affected villages on the coastline were densely populated. These villages expanded over the last 50 years in all directions including eastwards on the beachfront. Entire families worked in the fishing trade, men ventured in to the sea to catch fish, women and children worked on the beaches drying fish, cleaning and mending the fish nets. Women mostly sell the fish in nearby towns and villages.
The village Nallavadu, I visited is densely populated with 165 families and 1300+ population occupying the total area of about 3.75 acres of land. This is a strange village, which is surrounded by the Pondicherry territory on all three sides and the sea on the east side. There is not even a square metre of land, which is not used up, in this tiny hamlet. The people had no choice but to expand their village eastwards on the seafront. All the houses on the beach were washed away by the tsunami. Luckily no one died in this village.
The fishermen have been granted pattas by local governments over the years for the plots and houses constructed in these villages. Pucca buildings were constructed under various schemes at these villages by government agencies. The fishermen built new houses unauthorizedly on the coastline. According to THE ENVIRONMENT (PROTECTION) ACT, 1986 (as amended up to 3rd October 2001) Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ), the CRZIII “The area up to 200 metres from the High Tide Line is to be earmarked as ‘No Development Zone’. No construction shall be permitted within this zone. It further says Construction/reconstruction of dwelling units between 200 and 500 metres of the High TideLine permitted so long it is within the ambit of traditional rights and customary uses such as existing fishing villages and gaothans. Building permission for such construction/reconstruction will be subject to the conditions that the total number of dwelling units shall not be more than twice the number of existing units; total covered area on all floors shall not exceed 33 percent of the plot size; the overall height of construction shall not exceed 9 metres and construction shall not be more than 2 floors ground floor plus one floor.”
But none of these regulations were implemented and the huts on the coastline were not regulated. The 200-500 metre limit if implemented without any violation would have saved many lives. But villages and houses up to 1km from the shoreline were effected by the recent Tsunami is only a pointer to the highest safety and precaution needed to be built in to the regulations depending on the topography of the villages and their location near sea and back waters near the sea.
This shows all rules were broken in building houses on the beaches. Fishermen villages at Cuddalore, Chidambaram, Nagapattinam are densely populated and their houses were situated literally on the high tide line on the beaches. This has resulted in heavy death toll. The government should strictly apply the CRZIII guidelines while reconstructing the houses damaged and relocate these villagers safely beyond the 500 metre limit and continue to monitor no one moves with unauthorized dwellings near the high tide line in the years ahead.
# posted by Prasad P.N., Pondicherry @ 4:30 PM 
