Natural Disasters and Relief Provisions in India: Commitments and Ground Realities
Since the commencement of the 9th Finance Commission, we have in place the Calamity Relief Fund (CRF) scheme of the Central Government for financing relief expenditure of States in the wake of natural calamities. The present study is an attempt towards looking at various pertinent issues that have wide ranging implications for the welfare of the marginalised sections of our country who are the worst affected lot in the wake of any natural calamity.
Our efforts are directed towards highlighting our main objectives , some of which are to assess the macro-level implications of the present framework / design of CRF scheme from the point of view of those sections of the population who need it most, to assess how much the CRF scheme is helping the States in meeting expenditure on relief works in the wake of natural calamities and to highlight the irregularities in the implementation of the scheme at the ground level, especially those which affect the vulnerable sections of the society. We have also tried to look at the ground realities in implementation of this scheme and its impact in a few sample constituencies in the States of Rajasthan, Orissa, and Gujarat.
