India's heatwave action plans poorly funded, fail to identify vulnerable groups: Study

Action plans prepared by the state and city governments to address the grave challenges posed by heat waves are weak and inefficient as they lack structural support like funding and fail to protect the vulnerable communities, a study by the Centre for Policy Research has said.

The CPR's report 'How is India Adapting to Heatwaves?' assessed 37 heat action plans (HAP) from states and cities across the country. The solutions in the HAPs were evaluated against 12 parameters, from identifying the hazards to recognising the vulnerable as well as the efficacy of the plans in the long-term.

India is among the countries most exposed to heat waves. Between 1951 and 2016, events like three concurrent hot days and hot nights have increased significantly. The number of such events are projected to increase between two and four-fold by 2050 in the moderate (RCP 4.5) and high emission (RCP 8.5) scenarios.

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Aditya Valiathan Pillai and Tamanna Dalal of the CPR found that most of the action plans do not address the realities at the local level and have an oversimplified view of heatwave. "Only 10 of the 37 HAPs reviewed seem to establish locally-defined temperature thresholds though it is unclear whether they take local risk multipliers (such as humidity, hot nights, duration of continuous heat among others) into account to declare heatwave," they stated, adding that climate projections were not integrated into planning needs.

They also expressed concerns that only two of the 37 action plans explicitly carry out and present vulnerable assessments. With no data on the groups that need help, the action plans end up not helping the people who deserve it in the time of crisis. "The HAPs recognise the differential and gendered vulnerability but there is insufficient evidence on how this feeds into solutions to reduce vulnerability," it said.

The study said 70% of the plans lack financial mechanisms to implement the proposed projects. Only 11 of the 37 HAPs discussed funding sources. Even among the 11, eight plans asked the implementing departments to self-allocate resources. Stating that there is a serious funding constraint, the study said, "We propose systematically mapping HAP interventions against existing state and central schemes to unlock unding."

Most of the HAPs had no legal sources of their authority, indicating a lack of bureaucratic incentive to comply with the instructions in the action plans. Besides leaving a void in the understaffed and overburdened implementation agencies, lack of legal source also reduces accountability of implementing agencies, the study noted.
Worryingly, many HAPs were not listed online, making it unclear whether the HAPs were being updated periodically. The CPR suggested that the National Disaster Management Authority should create a repository of HAPs that is publicly accessible.

The study also recommended capacity building by targeting key sectors of health, construction and schools. "They (HAPs) place far less emphasis on the capacity of transformative, cross-cutting actors like government departments, civil society and local heat research ecosystem," it noted.

More than half of the plans fail to address the risks faced by sections of people who are more vulnerable to heat stress due to their gender, poverty and other causes. The study noted that the plans either lack legal foundations are have weak links that fail to provide confidence or accountability.