War, or an “undeclared war” involving active conflict like the ongoing one between India and Pakistan, does not involve only the armed forces. It potentially involves each and every citizen of the country. While the armed forces actively engage the enemy, it is up to the citizens to prepare themselves for emergency situations arising from possible enemy attacks on civilian areas.
The go-to has remained on our mental back-burner, only now fished out from the bottom with an almost-war going on. It is the little-known ‘civil defence’, the drills of which train citizens to protect and help themselves during man-made or natural emergencies, without waiting for better-trained professionals from departments concerned to arrive on the scene, saving crucial time. Civil defence training is key to making citizens familiar with what steps to take to mitigate damage to life or property in such situations.
The cowardly terror attack of April 22 in Pahalgam in South Kashmir claimed the lives of 26 innocent, unarmed male tourists. The resulting beyond-the-threshold spike in tension in the Indo-Pak relations saw India clinically targeting nine terror locations — five in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir and four in Pakistan — in the wee hours of May 7.
Anticipating a response from Pakistan, and a war, the Centre announced nationwide civil defence mock drills for citizens, starting May 7, in all 244 civil defence districts of the country. These are specially designated regions acting as administrative hubs to facilitate civil defence preparedness to train civilian citizens in emergency preparedness and response.
However, the public response to the call for the mock drills has been lukewarm, even as these drills fail to cover the entire population. Of the 244 civil defence districts, three are in Karnataka — Bengaluru, Uttara Kannada and Raichur. But many people living in these areas failed to even hear air raid sirens, let alone being a part of the drills.
Technologies in modern warfare do not exempt citizens from being vulnerable to attacks just because they are far from the international borders shared with the enemy country. Missiles apart, terror attacks have taken place thousands of kilometres away from the sources of blessings and patronage for the terrorists involved.
Besides, natural disasters, or even other man-made disasters, often come without warnings. That raises the level of importance for each adult citizen to be trained in civil defence drills, making it imperative for the state government to ensure that civilians remain in a state of readiness to respond to emergencies.
Civil defence mock drills involve simulated emergency conditions, as close to real scenarios, arising from air raids; natural disasters; terror attacks; building/bridge collapses; road, rail or air disasters; gas cylinder explosions; or even sudden medical emergencies like, for example, a large number of people affected by severe food or water contamination. It is not just responding to air raid sirens and ensuring that glass windows of our houses are covered with dark paper to prevent light from spilling out at night to alert enemy pilots — something older adults are familiar with from the days of the 1971 war with Pakistan.
Civil defence involves training citizens to save oneself and others from threat situations. The training and drills include learning medical resuscitation; first-aid use in medical emergencies; different kinds of body lifts to evacuate the injured, depending on the nature of injuries; learning to tie different types of knots on ropes to secure the injured from locations posing a challenge for evacuating the victims; besides minimising injuries to self during air raids, missile attacks, various types of disasters/ accidents or natural catastrophes. Another objective of civil defence — besides saving lives and minimising loss of property — is to keep people’s morale high during calamities.
Civil defence training must be made mandatory to all, beginning with basics taught in schools and colleges to every student. More so, because the training would come in handy to save someone needing help, and such situations can come without warnings.
We need to realise: members of the armed forces heroically fight on the fronts, but they undergo intense training over years to deliver their best to protect the country. But they were once civilians themselves. It’s from among the civilians that gritty soldiers, sailors and airmen emerge. Some make it to the armed forces, many don’t. But the spirit among civilians to protect and save each other, during times such as the present, must be, and remain, strong. Civil defence drills the ‘civilian warrior’ into us.