CIRCUIT BREAKER. Is India Inc prepared to face disaster?

Much water has flowed under (or over) the bridge on the Chennai floods. In the aftermath of the disaster, there has been a lot of public scrutiny of the disaster management plans of Central and State government agencies.

But if state agencies and providers of public utilities are accountable for the disruption of basic services during disasters, can the supposedly-more-efficient private sector, for whose services we pay through the nose, be let off the hook?

Certainly not, because businesses the world over, especially those that provide essential services to the public, have well-documented processes in place and spend billions of dollars to ensure business continuity in the aftermath of both natural and manmade disasters.

Both public and private sector agencies seemed to be equally at sea during the worst of the floods. As incessant rain and then flooding pummelled the city between December 2 and December 8, Chennai residents had reason to feel let down by the entire gamut of hi-tech services they rely on to see them through emergencies.

At the first sign of rain on December 1, the set-top box bowed out, with a polite message urging you to “switch off the set-top box and wait until the rains stopped”. As the rains didn’t oblige until December 5, you couldn’t rely on the television to relay any further news on the disaster. When the power supply too gave way the next day (supply was switched off by TNEB in 70 per cent of the city to prevent electrocution), it was back to the old battery-powered transistor radio for updates.

Mobile phone and data connections were quick to fail too. Every telco, including the state-owned BSNL, managed patchy connectivity in a few localities, only to fail in others.

The fortunate few who had access to Twitter managed to convey their angst through social media, where complaints continued to trickle in until as late as December 8, a week after the peak rains.

The cellular industry body attributed the disruption to severe damage to telecom towers. As the power shutdown forced operators to rely on backup diesel generators, it said water-logging and the short supply of diesel caused even these backup arrangements to trip up.

Hard cash became king, as most retail outlets and even pharmacies stopped accepting plastic: their POS machines wouldn’t work. Yet, as residents rushed to replenish their stock of household essentials, most ATMs in the city ran dry by December 3. Banks blamed this on lack of power, bad roads and lack of transport to ferry cash.

But the surprising fact in all this was that while one could lay one’s hands on periodic updates from the TNEB on how many of its substations were up and running (70 per cent shut down on December 3, with most supply restored by December 7), and from the State transport corporation on how many of its buses were plying (65 per cent on December 5), such factual updates were missing from the private sector service providers.

Going by the number of complaints about the telcos on Twitter, mobile connectivity issues in the city persisted until December 8. It is also clear that some ATMs were shut even after power supply resumed and vehicles returned to the roads.

Surely, this was not the first time Indian telcos or banks saw their ground-level infrastructure hamstrung by floods and power shut-downs (remember the Mumbai rains of 2005 and the J&K floods last year?).

What have they learnt from such experiences to ensure better service in the future?

Here, I recall a 2012 visit to AT&T’s Global Network Operations Centre at New Jersey, which functions as its global control room for disaster management. At this massive facility, over 130 staff keep 24/7 watch on operations across the seven continents, through live screens.

Whenever disaster struck, be it the Tokyo earthquake or Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, the GNOC was able to gauge the spike in traffic into the affected area within minutes of the event, and even alert other governmental agencies to kick into action.

AT&T sank an annual investment of $20 billion into these operations at the time to ensure that emergency and relief responses weren’t hampered by lack of network.

Even allowing for some Indian inefficiency and admitting that no agency, either public or private, can ensure uninterrupted services through a disaster of this magnitude, what consumers would have greatly valued from their service providers was an honest admission of failure, and regular updates on the restoration of service.

State agencies were content with media conferences to showcase their service ‘efficiency.’ Bald statements from the State electricity board on the number of functional sub-stations, and by Aavin on the lakh litres of milk supplied, still seemed far more useful than the vague missives and ‘personal’ e-mails that private service providers chose to send out.

After stating that “Our thoughts and prayers are with you in these trying times following the recent floods” and that its primary concern was “for my welfare” an e-mail from a private bank admitted that “one or two” of its branches were still non-operational, as late as December 9! It was also irksome that, in updating their customers, private firms seemed to be torn between attempts at self-promotion, and offering genuine information.

One leading telecom operator, in a public missive on December 2, perfunctorily admitted to the disruption of “essential services” and stated that it was “working relentlessly” with local authorities to enable “smooth communications”. But much of this message was actually devoted to announcing “special” offers for its Chennai customers in their time of need.

As most telcos rolled out generous offers of “free talk time”, “free data” and “helplines” on December 2 and 3, many Chennaiites were gnashing their teeth in frustration, given that their basic phone services were still dead.

The new breed of internet businesses was not far behind in brand-building either. Cab aggregators offered free rides and free pickup of relief supplies on December 2 and 3 to #KeepChennaimoving and restaurant aggregators promised to deliver a free meal for every paid meal order.

But those residing in the city can appreciate that in the worst-affected areas of the city, the only free meals that would have provided relief were those airdropped by helicopters. Availing of those “free rides” was only a pipe dream as most operators had no cabs even for commuters willing to pay twice the normal fare.

After all this, with Chennai now limping back to normalcy, it would be good too see sector regulators directing their corporate constituents to conduct an honest review of their disaster management plans. Essential service providers must be required to make mandatory investments in backup infrastructure and technology that will kick in during emergencies.

Public disclosure of the disaster preparedness of these businesses is a must.

Only then will Indian consumers be able to keep faith that the vast variety of digital, tech-enabled and ‘new-age’ products and services that are wooing them today, aren’t just fairweather friends.