Village Level Disaster Risk Management through Participatory Learning and Action (PLA) at Uttarakhand Himalaya, India

Participatory Leaning and Action (PLA) approach was exercised in the village Jardhar situated on the foot hills of Himalaya above 1550 meters above the sea level, lying between Latitude 30° 32:25’ -30 ° 34.08′N and Longitude 78°34.’-78°36′E. The total population of this village is around 1484. Rationale behind this study is to empower the rural communities and to follow the bottom up approach for the development of a village level disaster management plan. As we know in case of any disaster community is the first responder, so it is indeed required to analyze the risk on community level and to suggest the Village Level Disaster Risk Management solutions. While conducting the PLA, it was noticed that this small pocket of population has got benefits from various government (national and international) schemes. Government of India has specified all sorts of support to rebuild their livelihood. A number of schemes i.e. MGNREGA are implemented in the village which are beneficial in order to reduce the disaster risk and parallelly such schemes generates the employment for the village people. In the study risk mapping have been done through the personal interview methods and observations and later it has been converted into Geographical Information System platform for the location accuracy and analysis. A village level disaster management plan further suggested for the Jardhar to manage the risk of various hazards and disasters.