CIVIL DEFENCE IN INDIA
INTRODUCTION
The policy of Government of India till the declaration of emergency in 1962 was confined to make the States and Union Territories conscious of the need of the Civil Defence measures and to ask them to keep ready Civil Defence Paper Plans for major cities and towns.
Two events of major significance which gave fillip to Civil Defence in India, took place since independence.
The first, which really marked the revival of Civil Defence in the Country, was the Chinese aggression in November, 1962.
The other was the Indo-Pakistan conflict in September 1965, when, for the first time after independence, the Nation was subjected to enemy air attacks.
This led to considerable rethinking about the policy and scope of Civil Defence and as a result the Civil Defence policy, as it exists today, was evolved.
The country was subjected to further hostile attacks from Pakistan in December 1971 when the Civil Defence Organization equitted itself commendably.
Since then, as per policy, the revision and renewal of categorized towns is being done at regular intervals, the basic criteria of categorization remains the threat perception.
Up to 1985, all Civil Defence preparedness was restricted against threat of conventional weapons.
During 1985, revision of list of categorized Civil Defence towns, preparedness against nuclear threat to a very limited extend was considered by the Ministry.
The revised list of CD categorized towns was finalized and issued vide Govt. of India letter No: VIII-11 011/41/98-DGCD(CD) Dated 01.06.1999.
In that 225 CIVIL DEFENCE towns have been categorized including 13 Cat. IA CD towns.
Civil Defence is to be organized as an integral part of the Defence of the Country.
The scale is to be such as the Nation can live with it on long term basis.
It is to be appropriately augmented as and when the situation worsens.
