valedictory session of Volunteers Training Programme organized by the Disaster Management Cell (DMC), Noida

NOIDA ROHIT SHARMA

Shri N. P. Singh District Magistrate, Gautam Budh Nagar today presided the valedictory session of Volunteers Training Programme organized by the Disaster Management Cell (DMC), Noida & National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) from Sept 23-30, 2016 in association with Shuttl (Technical & Logistics partner) and Policy Perspectives Foundation (Knowledge partner). Dr. Kumar Raka, Planning Specialist & Head, DMC, Smt. Manju Sharma, Principal Degree College, Shri Veer Singh, Vice President, Shuttl, Prof. Anwar Alam of PPF and Shri J.V.S. Chaudhary, disaster management experts and IG, ITBP (Retd) were present during the programme. In his inaugural speech Shri N. P. Singh highlighting vulnerability of Gautam Budh Nagar stressed the need of preparedness, mitigation, response & relief measures and importance of the role of a trained volunteer in these 4 cycles of disaster management.

Shri Veer Singh, Vice President Shuttl told that disaster management need to be included in the curriculum of schools and colleges as a subject so that the awareness generation and such life saving skills reaches as many students as possible as they are the torchbearers of our future. He also assured to continue his support to the DMC in future as well for such grandiose endeavors towards disaster management. Prof. Anwar Alam, Senior Fellow, PPF congratulated all the stakeholders for organizing such a grand training programme and  congratulated volunteers from all over Gautam Budh Nagar who successfully completed learning life saving skills.

The valedictory session was attended by more than 200 citizens, students and their teachers. Volunteers training programme of DMC has received an overwhelming response from the community and the students. Master trainers of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) imparting Life Saving Skills Training to the volunteers so that they can be prepared to help themselves, their family and the larger community in case of any disaster or emergency.

Shri N. P. Singh, district magistrate announced results of the successful participants and distributed a First Aid Kit, Volunteers Dress (T-shirts & Cap), Certificate and a carry bag to 18 successful participants today. Smt. Vimlesh Sharma, Village Head Nithari and Shri N.P. Singh, President, FONRWA were also amongst the successful participants. Later on, all these items will be provided to all successful volunteers by the DMC, Noida.

A total of 607 volunteers have been trained in this training out of which 325 were female volunteers, a surprising 54% participation by the female volunteers. Senior citizens and young students also very enthusiastically participated in the training.DMC Noida had targeted to train only 500 community volunteers in the first phase but with overwhelming interest, enthusiasm and passion of volunteers for this training the targeted number has been crossed and today Faculty Members of the Degree College, Sector 39, Noida have also participated in the life saving trainings given by the NDRF.   

Dr. Kumar Raka, Planning Specialist and Head, DMC told that completion of the training is just the beginning towards a disaster resilient NGY. Now the real task of enrollment of successful volunteers with the Emergency operation Centre (EOC)/ DM Cell, organizing these volunteers into different groups by area, village and sector wise, assigning each group with a group leader and involving all the volunteers in the awareness generation, preparedness & mitigation measures and finally to prepare them to help the community till arrival of the specialized response forces in case of a major disaster has to began with. This would be achieved by regular basic & refresher training and mock drills involving the volunteers and disaster management experts.