The Special Centre for Disaster Research (SCDR) was inaugurated by the Union Minister of State for Home Affairs, Kiren Rijiju on 26 October 2017 at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) in New Delhi.
Underlining the fact that India is a disaster-prone country and disasters will only grow in intensity and frequency, the Minister said that the country should equip itself to face ‘severe’ disasters. He said that Disaster Risk Management education should be integrated into the educational institutions’ curriculum to give a boost to the culture of disaster preparedness.
Further, praising JNU for taking the initiative in this regard, Rijiju said that he hoped more educational institutions will come forward to conduct similar specialized studies in DRM.
The launch programme was a part of two-day Seminar being organised by JNU on ‘Disasters and Community Resilience in the Northeastern States’.
Key Highlights
• The multi-disciplinary Centre will offer Masters and Doctorate programmes in Disaster Risk Management (DRM).
• It mainly aims to take a trans-disciplinary approach for research without confining it to just social sciences or natural sciences.
• It also plans to include scientific findings and social sciences to decipher and direct the findings to communities and institutions for decision making.
• The focus of the new Centre for the first year will be the north-eastern states.
• As its inaugural event, the centre would be hosting a two-day workshop on various topics.
Background
The thought of setting up the centre was conceived three years ago.
JNU had signed a MoU to set up the centre with the National Institute of Disaster Management (NIDM) on 6 August 2015.
Besides inaugurating the centre, the Union Minister also inaugurated the centre's official website and released a book titled, ‘Disaster Law, Emerging Thresholds’ by Prof. Amita Singh, the first Chairperson of the new Centre.
Comments
All Comments (0)
Join the conversation