How disaster ready are we?

Japan’s nuclear nightmare, unfolding in trickles, has sent governments all over the world scurrying, nervously asking questions about safety in the event of the unforeseen. On the other side of the fence, the pro-nuclear lobby is trying hard to quell any unease by arguing that a one-off disaster does not a write-off make. Even as the big debate remains “to have or not-to-have”, countries with a nuclear energy programme need to ask themselves one big question. Do they have a 10/10 score when it comes to a level of preparedness that can deal with a cataclysmic disruption?

That is the only soul searching India needs to do on behalf of its citizens before it commits to an unwavering nuclear energy plan. Will its rescue machinery display orderliness in the middle of a catastrophe and does the government have the grit to build back a devastated city like the Japanese did with Hiroshima? Historically, India has dealt with a great many of its own disasters from the Bhopal gas tragedy, the Latur earthquake to the Mumbai hotel siege and survived. That survival, though, had more to do with the will of its people, much less the preparedness of the administration to deal with debilitating emergencies.

The Bhopal gas tragedy is a case in point. In December 1984, shortly after midnight, methyl isocyanate gas leaked at a chemical plant killing some 8,900 immediately. Over the years, the number has swelled to 25,000. One drawn-out farce, among several others, in that tragedy was the compensation battle for the victims. The site of the plant is now shuttered and abandoned. It was only in 2010 that a ministerial group was formed to figure how the toxic waste from the plant could be dumped, the environment cleaned and the victims rehabilitated. A remarkable 26 years later.

Hiroshima’s bombing in 1945 wiped out more than 70,000 residents. The entire town was razed to the ground. A month after the bombing, Hiroshima was struck by Typhoon Ida killing another 3,000 and destroying whatever the bombing had spared. By 1958, however, the population of the city had returned to the pre-war years, touching 400,000 and the city had been rebuilt and made livable. The only sign of the atomic bombing was the Hiroshima Peace Dome with its exposed skeleton as a grim and only reminder of the city’s ravaged past. Hiroshima is home to car maker Mazda and several other manufacturing units, with the lowest cost of living among top Japanese cities. Ironically, some firms looking to evacuate employees from the Tokyo area after last week’s tsunami chose to move them to Hiroshima to avoid radiation hazards. One quarter of Hiroshima’s electricity is from nuclear power.

India, the sixth largest nuclear power generator in the world, has 20 nuclear reactors. So far, we haven’t had any nuclear tragedies of the stress-test kind. But don’t take that to be the ultimate vote of confidence. The safety our nuclear installations can at best be viewed as our ability to operate plants with the same level of technical expertise as anywhere else in the world. Every lurid disaster, natural or man-made, has exposed our under-preparedness. Until we can fix that, an over-arching nuclear programme will always sit with unease on citizens who know that in the event of a crisis, the government isn't always the friend to count on.

In today’s world, as live images of destruction, rescue and reconstruction bombard citizens every day, it’s going to be hard work to get the green flag on nuclear expansion and pretend our inconsistencies, sticky as they are, can be brushed into oblivion.

Anjana Menon is Executive Editor, NDTV Profit. The views expressed here are personal