Entire country needs to be trained in combating disasters: NDRF

With disasters like earthquake, floods and structure collapses occurring frequently in India, the national calamity response force NDRF feels it is time that citizens are "trained" in combating both man-made and natural catastrophes.

The view has also been endorsed by a recently published IIT Delhi case study on the working of the force.

For the first time, the elite technology institution has worked on and prepared an analytical report on the response mechanism and challenges facing the National Disaster Response Force under the topic: "Leading from the Front: Awareness, Engagement and Intervention for Community Empowerment." 

The study paper, conducted by two researchers Dr Mahim Sagar and Deep Shree, was presented during the two-day 'Conference on Brand Management' hosted by the Indian Institute of Technology here with an aim to "aggregate and share the latest research findings on brand management." 

The conference concluded on Sunday. While making his intervention during the presentation of the study yesterday, NDRF Director General O P Singh stressed on the need to build a cohesive and structured response by the country in the face of disasters.

"We empower the community on a regular basis as part of our social commitment which also works as our external branding. We do this when we are not tackling disasters.In fact, our view is that the entire nation needs to be trained on disaster management and disaster response and therefore, there has to be training on a regular basis," the DG said while interacting with researchers, scholars and faculty at the IIT here.