Tsunami victims remembered across the Tamil Nadu

Chennai: Survivors of the tsunami of 2004 offered prayers with fl­o­wers, milk and tears at several beachside spots struck by the Boxers Day disaster that consumed over 7,000 lives in Tamil Nadu.

Memorial services were held at several places in Ch­ennai, Nagapattinam, Cud­dalore, Puducherry, Tir­u­nelveli and Kanyakumari, among other places, where the morning-walkers, fishers and tourists on the be­aches perished in hundreds under the giant waves ca­used by the undersea earthquake in Indonesia. Pro­pe­rties worth crores of rupees were destroyed.

Relatives of the dead po­ured milk into the sea at several beaches as offerings to the departed souls on this ninth anniversary of the disaster that recorded the worst death toll in tsunamis in history. Fishermen’s as­so­ciations and priests from nearby churches also parti­cipated in the solemn ceremonies, along with local officials.

While some complaints persist regarding non-fulfil­lment of rehab targets, the government has by and la­rge done great job in mitigating the survivors’ mise­ry and also ensuring that the seaside communities are warned when natural disasters, including cyc­lones and tsunamis, strike in the future.

“Tamil Nadu handled the tsunami disaster very well. The government at that ti­me (Ms Jayalalithaa was the chief minister) took qu­i­ck decisi­ons, arranged for food and medical help im­m­e­diately, released funds for acquisition of land from private parties for building houses for the displaced families and tied up with NGOs for putting up houses in the first phase before taking up more housing proje­cts,” rec­alled revenue secretary Gagandeep Singh Bedi. As collector of Cud­da­lore, one of the badly hit di­s­tri­cts in that tsunami, Be­di had worked 24x7 at that time to help the victims.

In fact, construction of pu­c­ca houses for the tsunami-hit fishermen minim­is­ed damage to their dwe­lli­ngs when Thane cyclone hit the coast last year. Also, the '1,418 crore ‘coastal disaster risk reduction project’ re­cently announced by the CM is expected to further strength coastal infrastructure, including com­­mu­ni­cation systems to warn seaside communities in time, creating rural ho­using, evacuation shelters and pu­t­ting up undergr­ound EB cables in vulnerable places, Bedi pointed out.