The Minister emphasized India's Zero Casualty Approach in disaster management and the need for space technology in flood control.

Key directives towards Flood Management

• Uniform Road Designs: Ensured drainage integration in road designs, particularly for state and district highways.
• Forest Expansion in River Basins: Increasing Forest cover in Narmada River basin for basin revival, soil erosion reduction, etc.

About Flood Management

• Flood Definition: It is defined as, “High-water stages in which water over flows its natural or artificial banks onto normally dry land, such as a river inundating its floodplain.”
• Constitutional Provisions: Primary responsibility for flood control lies with the states Entry 17 of List II.
• Flood Management Architecture: Broadly Classified as-
  • Structural Measure:
    • Reservoirs mitigate floods by storing excess water (e.g., DVC dams in Damodar Basin).
    • Embankments, in flood-prone states, provide effective flood protection. E.g., Over 37,000 km built under the Flood Management Programme.
    • Detention Basins/ Wet Lands: Detention basins are usually formed by utilizing natural depressions/ swamps and lakes. E.g., Mokama Tal (Bihar).
  • Non-Structural Measures
    • Flood Plain Zoning: Aims to manage flood plains by demarcating flood-prone areas for restricted development.
    • Flood forecasting: Managed by the Central Water Commission (CWC), is a cost-effective measure for flood management.
      • Flood forecasting has been extended from 3 to 7 days.