Tsunami-Hit Indian Churches Put Together Relief and Rescue Measures

Posted: 27th December 2004

Lunawa (Sri Lanka), after tragedy

INDIA
NEW DELHI (UCAN): The Catholic and Protestant Churches in India have swung into relief and rescue operations for victims of the tsunamis that claimed some 6,000 lives across southern India and its islands Dec. 26.

Caritas India, the social-service agency of the country's Catholic bishops, is to provide 500,000 rupees (US$11,100) to each affected diocese as initial assistance. According to the agency's director, Father John Noronha, more aid would be given according to the need of each diocese.

Caritas India has approved the use of 10 million rupees for assistance, he told UCA News Dec. 27.

Among dioceses requesting help in hard-hit Tamil Nadustate are Madras-Mylapore and Pondicherry-Cuddalore archdioceses, and Thanjavur, Tuticorin and Kottar. Alleppey, Quilon and Verapoly dioceses in neighboring Kerala state, on the western coast, also requested help.

Father Noronha said his agency would appeal to all Catholics in the country to donate to relief operations. "We have told all dioceses in affected areas to go ahead with relief work."

The Caritas official reported that thousands were evacuated to churches and Christian institutions along the country's southern coast. "All our institutions have been opened for relief work," he said.

As of 5 p.m. on Dec. 27, Indian media were reporting at least 2,500 deaths in Tamil Nadu and 3,000 in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a federally ruled territory in the Indian Ocean. They reported 200 deaths in Andhra Pradesh and 150 in Kerala.

Waves as high as 10 meters hit islands and coastal areas in the Indian Ocean region following an undersea earthquake off the northern coast of Sumatra, the main western Indonesian island. The quake measured 9.0 on the logarithmic Richter scale, only half a step behind the highest recorded magnitude of 9.5.

At 6:45 p.m. the British Broadcasting Corporation was reporting that the death toll would surpass 20,000 in all. It gave country totals of: 10,800 in Sri Lanka, 4,500 in Indonesia, 2,958 in India, 839 in Thailand, 44 in Malaysia, 32 in the Maldives, 30 in Myanmar and two in Bangladesh.

Caritas India also appealed to Caritas Internationalis, the worldwide network of Church social-service agencies mandated by local Church hierarchies, for 1 million euros as initial help. The Indian agency sent its deputy director, Father Varghese Mattamana, and a senior staff member to Chennai, the Tamil Nadu capital, to coordinate assistance efforts there.

The Church of North India also mobilized relief and rescue resources. CNI general secretary Reverend Enos Das Pradhan told UCA News its dioceses and social-service agency, Church's Auxiliary for Social Action, rushed relief assistance. He said the agency has covered most of southern India through existing mechanisms. "It is now focusing on rushing relief to Andaman and Nicobar and other areas where relief has yet to reach," he added. The Church has an Andaman diocese.

The National Council of Churches in India is to set up community kitchens in 140 centers to feed the displaced, and has asked member Churches and ecumenical partners for help.

The council plans to conduct counseling for the bereaved and dispossessed and provide dry food materials to 20,000 displaced families. Other plans include medical assistance, including vaccination against possible epidemics.

Article Source: UCANEWS