Opinions and suggestions from all sections will be collected to formulate various projects for the rebuilding of Kerala, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has said.
He was speaking after inaugurating a seminar and exhibition on ‘Disaster risk reduction for Navakeralam’, organised jointly by the Kerala State Disaster Management Authority, United Nations Development Programme and Sphere India.
“Many people have lost their houses in the floods. They cannot be kept waiting forever for new houses. The government wants to avoid all the usual delays involved in such processes. We are getting a lot of offers from various quarters for rebuilding of these houses. The cooperative sector makes an important contribution by rebuilding 2,000 houses. Cooperative institutions use a large proportion of their profits for the good of society,” he said.
Lauding the unity of the people in tiding over the flood situation, he said many who were in the scene of disasters had commended the way the people came together here, unlike anywhere else.
Official machinery
“Usually in such situations, it is the official machinery and the volunteers that come along with it who carry out these rescue and relief operations. The larger society never gets involved much in it. But here the case was different. We saw this unity continuing even after the floods, when the public got involved in cleaning up of houses, to make it liveable. This is a reflection of Kerala’s secular mindset,” said the CM.
Revenue Minister E. Chandrasekharan presided over the function.
He said Kerala faced the biggest disaster the world witnessed this year. A total of 34 lakh people had to be brought to relief camps from the early days of rain in May to August.
Chief Secretary Tom Jose, in his keynote address, said we had to enhance the quality levels in each activity we take up as part of rebuilding Kerala.
This would include roads, which would last many years and buildings which could withstand calamities.