Thanks to the advancing information technology in India, the citizens would be very soon receiving alerts through SMSs and voicemails.
Disaster information technology in place to alert citizens about calamities
NEW DELHI: Thanks to the advancing information technology in India, the citizens would be very soon receiving alerts about disasters like floods, cyclones, earthquakes, tsunami, bomb-blasts and even epidemic outbreaks like cholera, dengue etc through SMSs and voicemails.
A Natural Disaster Information System (NDIS) developed by Geneva Software Technologies (GSTL) in collaboration with union ministry for Science and Technology (S&T) is in place to inform people about any disaster in the country, in their local language over mobile phones, landlines and specially set up Wireless Public Address System (WPAS) in their locality, in less than a minute.
This would not only give adequate time to the locals to act faster to mitigate the damage but also help in providing relief measures.
The system, something similar to BMC alerts on floods, would be mandatorily linked with all service providers and the alerts would be routed by the Indian Meterological Department (IMD) through the Disaster Management Cell (DMC) under union Ministry of Home Affairs.
“India is the first country in the world which has introduced an easy-to-use, bilingual disaster warning dissemination system. Through this system, the common man would know about natural disaster in 30 seconds.
This system would come handy in situations like Mumbai floods, tsunami, earthquakes and bomb blasts,” said union Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal. Officials in S&T ministry said the technology would be handy in situations like that of blasts, when mobile networks get clogged and only means of communications are SMS and HAM radio. “Even if the mobile lines are jammed by the police, alerts can still be sent,” said the official.
He added that in situations like Mumbai blasts, casualties could have been prevented by alerting people in time as all the seven blasts occurred in ten minutes while the alerts can reach within 30 seconds.
Alerts would be sent by the IMD which uses its web interface to key in a message or alert about a natural disaster anywhere in the country. The message will be sent to GSTL’s server from where it will be translated and streamed as multi-lingual message.
The Location Based Language Message Service (LBLMS) would map the location and identify the subscribers in that area to disseminate the alert. Within 30 seconds alerts would reach any mobile in 14 local languages without the need to download alert application. Besides, citizens would also get a voicemail, get calls on landlines and alerts through WPAS.
The cost of the project is Rs5.19 crore, of which Rs4.35 crore was given to the GSTL to develop the technology in collaboration with ministry of S&T. BSNL is the other partner in the project. The company was working on the project since September 2004.
“The project has been tested and we have demonstrated it to the Home Ministry. A final approval is being awaited,” said an official of MS&T. The system has also been demonstrated to ministries of Fisheries and Coastal Guards for alerting fishermen.
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}