By Izhar Wani (AFP)

SRINAGAR, India — One year after floods devastated an arid part of northwest India popular with foreign trekkers, claiming almost 200 lives, residents say the government has failed to deliver on pledges to help.

Thousands of visitors from India and elsewhere travel to the Himalayan region of Ladakh each year during July and August for trekking and rafting expeditions and to experience the area's ancient Buddhist culture.

TNN | Jun 20, 2011, 02.54am IST

PATIALA: Even as the Patiala district administration is yet to start any major effort to train residents of flood affected areas to tackle the calamity, a city-based NGO, Society for Peoples' Welfare & Awareness, Patiala (SPWAP) has decided to organize a three-day special training camp in BN Khalsa School from June 27 to train residents to tackle flood-related mishaps.

SANGRUR: As if a swelling Ghaggar during monsoons was not enough for causing damage, the construction of a 10-foot high concrete wall along the Hansi-Butana canal in Haryana is also expected to severely affect people living near the seasonal river.

The residents of about two dozen villages situated near Ghaggar`s banks are a worried lot because of the construction.

They have decided to approach state and Union authorities against this.

Just a short stroll through Rewali, Adampur, the mud embankment in Kaiserganj, Bahraich, a small district in the flood prone area of Uttar Pradesh, gives you an idea of the gravity of the predicament people here face year after year. Yet this year none seem to grumble their grievances about government apathy and inaction in rescue and rehabilitation work. In fact in most embankments the zeal to fight back the raging river shoulder to shoulder with district administration officials is a rare sight to see indeed.

The area was inundated for over a month

* Earthquakes, floods cost $109 bln in 2010 vs $35 bln 2009

* Decaying infrastructure described as risk in urban areas

By Laura MacInnis

GENEVA, Jan 24 (Reuters) - Natural disasters caused $109 billion in economic damage last year, three times more than in 2009, with Chile and China bearing most of the cost, the United Nations said on Monday.

The 8.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Chile in February cost $30 billion. Landslides and floods last summer in

IMD officials said the record heat in 2010 was a continuation of the warming trend in the past decade that can only be attributed to global warming. The last decade has been the warmest

Programme purpose: The 2010 disaster management programme is designed around the four disaster management strategic objectives of Indian Red Cross Society (IRCS) viz disaster risk reduction - "Building safer communities", national disaster preparedness and response mechanism, disaster preparedness and response capacity building of branches and inter- agency coordination.

The overall purpose of the health and care programme aligns with the Global Agenda goal 2, which is to improve IRCS's capacity in planning, to raise awareness on the preventive health

Summary: CHF 54,543 (USD 52,476 or EUR 39,516) has been allocated from the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies' (IFRC) Disaster Relief Emergency Fund (DREF) to support the India Red Cross Society (IRCS) in delivering immediate assistance to some 40,000 beneficiaries. Unearmarked funds to repay DREF are encouraged.

To date, out of the total budget of CHF 54,543 (USD 52,476 or EUR 39,516), CHF 38,569.18 (USD 38,631 or EUR 28,964.80) have been utilized.

IRCS deployed a team of staff and volunteers

Brief Description of the Emergency

Tamil Nadu has been receiving heavy and prolonged rains over the past two weeks, resulting in a rapid increase in water levels in dams, reservoirs and other water bodies across the State. Heavy rain continues to lash most parts of the state.

Impact

Close to 100 people have died over the last two weeks due to the heavy rains. In various rain-related incidents in Madurai district, 10 people died and 302 dwellings in the district were damaged. Nearly 13,600 huts were partially damaged, of which 8135 were