Making India Disaster Resilient: Challenges and Future Perspectives

Various natural and man-made hazards are nowadays increasingly considered as disasters, particularly by individual and communities are lacking in awareness and where a system as a whole has no adequate management mechanism. Consequently, the world is facing serious negative outcome in form of loss of life, injury, disability, loss of property, infrastructure, and economic disruption followed by psycho-social disorders. Other than this, disasters adversely affect wildlife and environment in long terms. Developing countries are worst sufferers as these regions are poorly prepared for potential hazards at one hand and are exposed to disasters due to the complexity of (socio-cultural, economic and physical) vulnerability. Government, World communities, NGOs are recognizing the problems and are trying to build resilient communities to reduce disaster impact at various levels.
Year 1990-99 was observed as the decade for natural disaster reduction by United Nations (UN) and United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR) was established to support and coordinate this movement. Year 2015 has been very important in the history as three global agreements have been signed by global communities (Sustainable development goals, Paris agreement and Sendai framework for DRR). Where, SDGs are extension of MDGs to make the planet more sustainable. It proposed 17 goals and 15 years' time frame adopted in the year 2015. SDGs target various social, cultural, economic, challenges followed by wildlife, environmental protection through knowledge share and technological innovation among all member countries. In December 2015, UNFCCC reached a landmark agreement to combat climate change and to accelerate and intensify the actions and investments needed for a sustainable low carbon future known as Paris agreement. Sendai Framework 2015 is voluntary, non-binding agreement which recognizes that the state has the primary role to reduce disasterrisk but that responsibility should be shared with other stakeholders including local government, the private sector and other stakeholders. This framework focuses on the pre-disaster management rather than post disaster relief and recovery.
This book is an insight into the various issues related to the emerging disasters (both natural and man-made), vulnerable communities, and government initiatives taken with a geographical focus on India. This volume contains selected chapters written by faculty and research scholars. This book is an empirical work on disasters vulnerabilities and management which will benefit researchers, academicians, professional, practitioners and policy makers.

Dr. Vishwa Raj Sharma, Professor at the Department of Geography, Shaheed Bhagat Singh College, University of Delhi, with more than 20 years of teaching and research experience. He received Ph.D. from the Department of Geography, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi. His field of specialization is environmental issues, urban planning and disaster management. He has published a number of research papers in national and international journals. His recent book 'Making Cities Resilient' published from Springer, Switzerland in 2023. He participated and presented research papers in many conferences in India and abroad, such as International Geographical Union (IGU) conferences held at Kyoto, Japan (2013), Krakow, Poland (2014), IGU Moscow, Russia (2015) and IGU Congress in Beijing, China (2016), IGU, Paris, France (2022) and ICSSR-JSPS joint academic program in March 2023 in Japan as a lead collaborator.
He completed a major research project entitled "Appraisal ofUrban Growth Dynamics and Pollution using GIS Techniques along River Yamuna", sponsored by Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) under IMPRESS Scheme. He worked as a co-investigator of the international research project 'Emerging Mega Regions and Socio-Economic Developments in Contemporary India: A Study of Delhi Mega Region, sponsored by Hiroshima University, Japan'. He completed Major Research Project entitled 'Sustainable Tourism Management in Agra: Carrying Capacity Assessment and Modelling' sponsored by the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) in the capacity of project director. He worked as Principal Investigator of two Innovation Research Projects 'Monitoring and Modeling Socio-Economic Impact of Land Use/Cover and Pollution along River Yamuna in Delhi' (2013-2014) and 'Earthquake Disaster Vulnerability Assessment and Management in Delhi' sponsored by University of Delhi (2015-2016).
He has been the convener of several nationalconferences and workshops and chaired and co-chaired sessions in conferences. Many institutions invited him to deliver lectures and talks from time to time. He received travel grants from University Grants Commission (UGC) in 2013 and 2016 and from Indian National Science Academy (INSA) in 2014 and ICSSR in 2022 to participate in international conferences abroad.
He contributed as a working group member for the revision of the Courses in University of Delhi and IGNOU. Presently he is the Academic Council Member of Dr. Bhim Rao Ambedkar University, Agra. He is also supervising and guiding Ph.D. students in University of Delhi. He contributed immensely in administrative, academic, cultural and social life of the college and University like Deputy Superintendent, Examinations, and Chief Coordinator admissions in SBS College.
He is a life member of several Academic and Professional bodies like NAGI, National Association of Geographers India, AGS, Association for Geographical Studies, Executive Member of Association for Geographical Studies, He represented as a Member of Advisory Board, Siddhant Raj Degree College affiliated to Dr. B R Ambedkar University, Agra and Member of Advisory Board, Centre for Disaster Management studies (CDMS) in Shaheed Bhagat Singh College. He is also a Member of International Geographical Union (IGU), Urban Commission on Urban Challenges in a Complex World and Commission on Megacities.
At present, Dr Chandrakanta is faculty at Department of Geography, North-Eastern Hill University (NEHU)-Shillong-India. Before joining NEHU, she was faculty at Department of Geography, Shaheed Bhagat Singh College (DU-Delhi) for more than 8 years. She is in teaching since 2009 and has taught at various others colleges also (Kamla Nehru College, B R Ambedkar College, Dyal Singh College) affiliated to University of Delhi (DU). She is MA in Geography from Aligarh Muslim University (AMU)-Aligarh, M. Phil and Ph. D in Population Studies from (CSRD) Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi. In addition, she has done PG Course on "International Migration, Ethnicity and Gender" from Linköping University, Sweden and PG Diploma in "Disaster management" and "Urban Planning and Development" from IGNOU. She is trained in disaster risk reduction from NIDM-India and on labour and migration issues from VV Giri national labour institute, Noida-India.
She received "Satpaul Mittal Award-2008" for research on population and related issues from "Indian Association of Parliamentarians on Population and Development" (IAPPD), and also nominated for "Honorary mention of the repons-Ability Paper Development Award" by the Oikos Young Scholars Development Academy-Switzerland in 2012 for her doctoral thesis (on Informal labour market and migration). She is also recipient of UNFPA & UNDP grant which supported her research on population and related issues which she presented at Paris-France and Nairobi-Kenya. She has also travelled Finland and Sweden for academic activities and has extensively travelled in India also where she has explored almost all the states and capitals of major states for research and field visits. Recently, she completed another edited book "Making Cities Resilient" published by Springer. She has been the member of the organizing committee of various national and international conferences, conclave, workshops focusing various contemporary geographical issues. She has been the founder and coordinator of "School of Happiness" and also coordinated various events for Centre for Disaster Management Studies (CDMS) -Shaheed Bhagat Singh College, DU-Delhi. At national and international events she has delivered lectures and also chaired session. Her current research interests and writing are concerned with the human population (fertility, mortality and migration), disaster management and urbanization.