Two Step Authentication

Year 2015: It’s lunch time in Mumbai’s commercial district of Nariman Point. People stroll on the sidewalks, some gather around a popular Dosa stall while others enjoy the sea breeze. Suddenly, the ground begins to shake violently, cars overturn, trees are uprooted and chunks of concrete and glass fall from skyscrapers. An hour earlier, the Indian Early Tsunami Warning System alerted Mumbai’s local government about an earthquake 300 miles off the city’s coast in the Arabian Sea. But before the administration could gear up, 20-metre high tsunami waves crashed furiously along the entire length of Mumbai’s western coastline.

Minutes later, a second, more powerful earthquake hit the city (magnitude 8.5 on the Richter Scale) and devastated entire neighbourhoods. At the landmark Queen’s Necklace, the line of art-deco buildings stood ravaged, large parts of the congested Kalbadevi and Girgaum areas were under 30 feet of water, and eyewitnesses said at least three residential high rise buildings collapsed in Cuffe Parade. Fire engines and ambulances could not proceed because the roads were blocked with uprooted lamp posts and debris. The iconic 2.2 km-long J J flyover was reported to be completely ripped apart and an unknown number of people are believed trapped or killed underneath it.

A naval helicopter taking stock of the destruction, relayed news that areas near the Bandra and Juhu coasts had simply disappeared, while parts of Jogeshwari to Malad were a mass of rubble. According to an estimate, as many as half a million people are dead and an equal number have become homeless without food and water. The civic health department warned of a cholera outbreak, which could kill thousands more.

This apocalyptic scenario could be the city’s worse nightmare, especially in the wake of last week’s catastrophic earthquake in Japan. India’s financial capital is vulnerable to natural calamities and is ill-prepared. Japan has an enviable disaster management plan in place since decades. During a trip to that country in 2006, this writer was shown the fire-fighting and emergency response capabilities in Fukuoka city.

The Fukuoka Citizens’ Disaster Prevention Centre is a place where you can learn about disasters and their precautionary measures. It has facilities that simulate earthquakes and violent wind conditions, and educational areas where visitors can practice fire-fighting and practical techniques for protecting against disasters. The center also sells disaster-prevention equipment, emergency food supplies, emergency supplies, and emergency related publications. On the other hand, Mumbai is still struggling to get its act together. It was totally unprepared when a freak cloud burst paralysed the city and killed over 400 people in what is now commonly known as the 26/7 deluge of 2005.

A 2007 study on the effects of global warming published in the journal, Environment and Urbanisation, lists Mumbai as one of the cities vulnerable to rising sea levels and says its people are at risk of being submerged. But more appalling are Mumbai’s man-made factors, which interfere with the environment and therefore, bound to have an adverse impact.

Haphazard development, destruction of mangroves, violation of Coastal Regulatory Zone norms, shrinking open space and dereservation of land earmarked as no-development zones are choking the city. Claiming land from the sea, like in Nariman Point, and mangrove-hacking could have serious repercussions, especially when sea levels are rising because of global warming. Mangroves, natural barriers against the sea (some Tamil Nadu villages were saved by these plants from the 2004 tsunami), have been relentlessly destroyed, at times with official connivance. Land-use maps show Mumbai and Navi Mumbai’s mangroves shrunk from 235 square kilometres in 1924 to 160 square kilometres in 1994. A thousand hectares are estimated to have been destroyed in Mumbai by 2000.

The business district of Bandra-Kurla Complex, for instance, came up on the river Mithi’s bend. This commercial hub was flooded during the 26/7 deluge; it was developed about two decades ago on largely mangrove-covered land. Unfortunately, the basic concept of town-planning – the raison d’etre of any city – was discarded a long time away by Mumbai’s gate-keepers. The politician-bureaucrat-builder nexus has destroyed – what renowned architect Charles Correa once said – this once-global city and turned it into a provincial town.