Flood Shelters: Lessons from Bangladesh

On NDTV's We The People (a weekly discussion program which airs every Sunday at 8.00 pm), this past week, there was an interesting comment from an audience member.

He said that in Bangladesh, the government has set up buildings (shelters) for people who are affected by the floods every year. Apparently, there are signs on the roads that will tell you how far the next shelter is and how to get there. During floods, people can go to the shelters to be safe, and can stay there till the situation returns to normal. I assume that the government has set up facilities for food and medicines as well.

What does this have to do with Bangalore? Well, for one, it's about learning from problems that we face.

We had bad water problems in Bangalore (and Karnataka) a couple of years ago. Last year was okay. Have we done anything to ensure that if the water problem occurs again this year, we'll be okay? Water harvesting anyone?