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Tap into soldiers’ expertise in disaster relief

Cyclone Fani has occupied centre stage right from its tracking to its landfall and the coordinated evacuation and relief operations along with the armed forces.

Tap into soldiers’ expertise in disaster relief

Cyclone Fani: With help from the Army, relief work was successfully done.



Maj Gen Amrit Pal Singh (Retd)

Maj Gen Amrit Pal Singh  (Retd)
Ex-Chief of Logistics, Ladakh region

Cyclone Fani has occupied centre stage right from its tracking to its landfall and the coordinated evacuation and relief operations along with the armed forces. It’s not uncommon to watch the news and hear every other day of a toddler falling into a borewell, and more often the Army is called out to execute the rescue. The floods in Uttarakhand, Srinagar and Chennai are among the few where the rescue efforts were seen live on television across the nation. 

An incident that happened at McLeodganj, Dharamsala, in 2014 comes to mind as one of the many unseen acts of daring rescues. The Triund peak is a trekkers’ destination. As Divisional Commander at Palampur, I received a frantic call one evening at 8 pm from an Air Commodore in Mumbai regarding his brother having gone missing from trekking to Triund peak that day. Apparently, he had left alone on the trek and was not to be found till late evening. His mobile phone was also not in communication range.

The Army garrison at McLeodganj was activated and both battalions prepared two teams each of personnel experienced in mountain rescue and recovery operations. The Brigade Commander was provided with helicopter sortie to be available at first light, courtesy the Western Command HQ at Chandimandir. Meanwhile, the teams immediately started along the trek route in the night to establish the likely areas where the trekker could have met with an accident. When the Brigadier got airborne early next morning, he set course to circle the area around Triund peak, all the while dialing the mobile of the lost trekker. Suddenly there was a response and a feeble voice answered — contact was established. The trekker told him that he had fallen down the hillside and broken a leg, and he couldn't move from the grotto he had taken shelter at night. 

This was the basis for the search and rescue of the lost trekker around midnight. He was finally recovered and carried back to a road on stretcher down the steep hill slopes by one of the teams that went up the hillside from the nullah route so that they could reach the area where the man had dropped down during his fall. Forty-eight hours had elapsed since the rescue started. 

The point being made is that this was a civilian who was in distress and normally the police and civil administration should have been entrusted with the rescue. It turned out that they were ill equipped, had no portable communication means and were only able to launch a search party in daylight the next day. Considering that the trekker had a broken leg, was without food and water and probably in trauma due to the cold and his wounds, any delay in launching a search could have proved fatal. The Army just stepped in as always expected and God was kind that all ended well. What is noteworthy is that the troops that step in for these roles are not specialists or regularly involved in such tasks. In fact, they are the same stock of the average village lads that they step in to rescue. Yet, they acquit themselves and put in their best due to the training they get and the leadership that prepares them for the task.

The Odisha Government has a good track record of handling disasters and such joint efforts showcase the positive and proactive role of the civil administration. Having said that, most of the times the administration is woefully underprepared despite having large allocation of funds, manpower and adequate warning. The preparations are at best a coordinating conference with the local Army garrison and the tendency is to leave the details to the Army columns. In times of natural calamities and other disasters, including law and order disturbances, the armed forces are called out to help the civil administration by a requisition from the local district magistrate. The armed forces take such duties seriously and prepare disaster relief columns of men and material and keep them on standby. The flood relief and internal security columns of troops are formed within battalions and units in the garrison and train for the task. All garrisons have a disaster and a flood relief plan and organise themselves to send in ‘Aid to Civil Authorities’ as per an overall coordinated military-civil effort. Every garrison is distributed responsibilities and the area is covered for immediate response by columns. 

The NDRF and state bodies are involved in larger operations that recur, such as flood relief operations during monsoons, especially in the North-East. Here too, the Army steps in to provide boats, build bridges, set up medical camps and reach out to remote pockets to provide succour and safety. 

The Army is a well-trained force and will always be looked upon to step in to help in all situations, be it disasters or terror strikes or even large mega events, where national pride and efficiency is at stake. There, however, is a case in point to clearly divide responsibility and resource, as the size of the Army and its nationwide deployment, make the large numbers of ex-servicemen the best suited for manning the various organisations created for disaster relief. The very nature of the exposure in all parts of the country and all types of operations, right from the planning, to the training and execution phases, makes them best suited for the task. The trained manpower, from pilots to crane and dozer operators and rescue teams are a resource that cannot be underutilised, especially when there is constant requirement of disaster relief across the country.

A case thus exists for the NDRF and state-level disaster relief contingents to be manned by ex-servicemen. An institutionalised mechanism to laterally absorb ex-servicemen into these contingents will not only prove beneficial to the state but also help provide re-employment to those superannuating. The success of the Ecological Territorial Army battalions in replanting green forests on denuded Himalayan ranges is an outstanding and live example of this model of employment by tapping into the rich reserves of expertise, practical experience and talent.

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