The inauguration of SiMEx-2013 in Silchar on Monday. Picture by UB Photos

Guwahati, Nov. 25: A five-day mega exercise aimed at assessing the state of preparedness to tackle disaster in Silchar began today.

During the exercise — SiMEx-2013 — calamitous situations such as earthquake and fire will be simulated to test the capabilities of emergency responders and other stakeholders.

Silchar, the headquarters of Cachar district, is the sixth city in the country and third in Assam to conduct such a mega exercise after Mumbai, Chennai, New Delhi, Guwahati and Jorhat.

Silchar is the third largest city in the state in terms of population and municipal area after Guwahati and Dibrugarh.

The exercise was inaugurated by revenue and disaster management minister Prithibi Majhi at a function at Rajiv Bhawan in Silchar this morning.

“This kind of exercise helps the administration and the stakeholders to calibrate response time and also helps in minimising casualties during disasters,” the minister said.

According to Majhi, SiMEx will help bring together the major responders and evaluate the real-time inter-agency communication and co-ordination.

The inaugural function was attended by excise minister Ajit Singh, Cachar deputy commissioner Jhuri Ohukan, director of welfare of plain tribes and backward classes department Silpi Rani Barman, principal of Silchar Medical College and Hospital P.K. Nath, pro-vice chancellor of Assam University K.V. Nagraj, representatives from Unicef, among others.

The exercise is being organised by the District Disaster Management Authority of Cachar under the aegis of Assam State Disaster Management Authority (ASDMA) and National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA).

The modules of SiMEx-2013 are emergency medical services, trauma life supports, emergency nursing services and mass casualty handling, community-based disaster risk reduction track, public health in emergencies track, training on co-ordination of response for heads of the line departments, search and rescue and incident response system and school disaster preparedness.

Deputy secretary of revenue and disaster management department and state project co-ordinator of ASDMA Nandita Hazarika said a table-top exercise would be held on Thursday and a mock drill on Friday where representatives from hospitals, fire and emergency service, State Disaster Response Force (SDRF), National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), will take part.

“This exercise is designed to harness the strengths and capabilities of the emergency responders, educational institutions, hospitals and NGOs,” Hazarika said.

Majhi said the Friday’s drill would push the medical response system to extreme scenarios, and would help the health sector professionals understand the challenges and ways to overcome disasters.

A debriefing session titled “Hotwash” will be conducted on the final day of the exercise.