With more heat-waves predicted this summer, the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) has critically assessed India's 37 ‘heat action plans' (HAPs), which include dos and don'ts for authorities and the general public, in 18 states and discovered major gaps at various levels, including a lack of location-specificity, vulnerability assessments, financing, and transparency. In the beginning of March, Prime Minister Narendra Modi presided over a high-level meeting to assess preparations for the upcoming summer's scorching weather.
During the meeting, the Prime Minister was briefed on the weather forecast for the next few months by the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), as well as the likelihood of a typical monsoon. He also learned about how the weather affected Rabi crops and the expected yield of important crops. The CPR, a think tank based in New Delhi, discovered that none of the HAPs reviewed indicate the legal sources of their authority, and nearly all plans fail to identify and target vulnerable groups.
The 37 HAPs reviewed include nine city-level plans, 13 district-level plans, and 15 state-level plans. Nagpur, Chandrapur, Ahmedabad, Rajkot, Surat, Vadodara, Bhubaneshwar, Vijaywada, and Rewari are among the reviewed cities, while Gorakhpur, Hazaribagh, Vellore, Patiala, Wardha, Gondia, Akola, Nanded, Latur, and Jalgaon are among the reviewed districts. The CPR abandoned many cities in northern states where the intensity of heat was greater than in the town under consideration. In Punjab, for example, the intensity of heat is greater in Amritsar and Ludhiana than in Patiala. It has also not placed its hands in Jammu, which also experiences intense heat during the summers in Jammu and Kashmir.
“In the last decade, India has made significant progress by developing a number of heat action plans.” However, our analysis reveals several gaps that must be addressed in future plans. If we do not, India will suffer economic losses as a result of declining labour productivity, sudden and frequent disruptions to agriculture, and unbearably hot cities as heat waves become more frequent and intense,” said Aditya Valiathan Pillai, associate fellow at CPR and co-author of the report. The report stated that the lack of legal sources of authority for plans “reduces bureaucratic incentives to prioritise and comply with HAPs instructions.” The HAPs are guidance documents developed by state, district, and city governments to assist in preparing for, responding to, recovering from, and learning from heat waves. One of their most important functions is to direct scarce healthcare, financial, information, and infrastructure resources to those in that jurisdiction who are most vulnerable to extreme heat. Though the exact number of HAPs in India is unknown, some estimates place the number at well over 100.
Heat wave warning systems (sharing alerts with vulnerable populations); means of coordination between various government departments; an awareness, training, and behaviour change component to reduce heat exposure; a list of short-term actions (focused on healthcare or changing work hours); and longer-term solutions such as investing in infrastructure (e.g., cool roofs, water harvesting bodies), changes in agricultural practice, or adjusting urb (e.g., green corridors). The facts remain that, in the absence of implementation-oriented HAPs, India's poorest will continue to suffer from extreme heat, at the expense of both their health and their income.
