Children worst affected in U'khand disaster

Children were affected most during the Uttarakhand flood disaster and many of the kids continue to have trauma and afraid of rains, the NDMA said.
During the recent disaster in Uttarakhand in which hundreds of lives were lost and huge infrastructure were damaged, children were the worst affected, the National Disaster Management Authority said in a study.
"Some children still have trauma of flood disaster and afraid of rain, a number of children have lost their lives and others have lost their parents and relatives during the disaster. Damage to school building has adversely affected the studies," it said.
The NDMA study said the trauma led to increase in number of drop-outs and not only school going children, but even the students studying in higher classes may drop out of schools as their parents have lost their livelihood and are now not able to meet the expenditure of the education.

Participating in a programme on Disaster Reduction day, NDMA member B Bhattacharjee stressed the need for giving lessons to students about natural calamities.
He favoured invention of instruments which could forecast calamities or earthquakes as this could subsequently reduce or lower the impact of any tragedy.

"The community or the people could go to safer places, if something is done before and also put some instrument which can know the calamity," he said.
Bhattacharjee also said there was a need to impart training to school students on how to deal with a calamity.
The students of Uttarakhand, where the tragedy happened also shared their experiences during the event.

The awareness materials developed by NIDM on Disaster Management was also released during the programme.