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Context
The massive earthquake happened on 26th January 2001 in Kachchh District of Gujarat State. Almost 15 districts of Gujarat were more or less affected by this disaster. Rescue teams from all the parts of the world came to the Kachchh and joined in rescue operations along with an army. They were unknown to this area and they were unable to find the ways to start their activities as well as unable to find out the affected areas and estimate the devastation. Communication and transportation systems were totally collapsed and regional government offices were severely damaged. In this critical time, there was an urgent need of road maps with all the village names, which can guide all the rescue teams to start their activities. EPC is a non-government and not for profit organization based in Ahmedabad that provides planning and Development management services and its business partner Geographis provides GIS-based mapping services to various government and private organizations. EPC had recently prepared a Sub-Regional Plan for Kachchh, commissioned by Deptt. of Urban Development and Urban Housing, Govt. of Gujarat. EPC had collected spatial information on region in digital format including base maps, thematic maps and intensive database of the region as a part of the preparation of Sub-Regional Plan. EPC had worked in closed collaboration with Kachchh Nav Nirman Abhiyan (KNNA) a network of grass root NGOs during preparation of Sub-Regional Plan.

Role of GIS initiated by EPC-Geographis
Immediately after the earthquake, EPC-Geographis through an Earthquake Technical Assistance Cell (ETAC), took several initiatives to support the relief and rehabilitation efforts in general and those of KNNA in particular. The main initiatives taken were

1. Providing Base Maps of the Region

• Soon after the earthquake one thousand sets of maps (A set includes a Kachchh district maps and three enlarged parts of Kachchh districts covering all the Talukas) with the village boundaries and major road network were sent for distribution among the various agencies. These maps guided several organizations including Govt. officials to send the rescue team & relief materials to the devastated area.
• Simultaneously, maps for all the affected districts of Gujarat were prepared and distributed by EPC-Geographis to facilitate the relief and rehabilitation operations in other districts.
• Almost all the agencies involved in relief and rehabilitation operations used the maps including district administration, various NGOs and International aid agencies like World Food Program (WFP), United Nations Development Program (UNDP).

2. Setting up an Information Center at Bhuj

• In the next week after earthquake, Abhiyan decided to set up an information center at Bhuj with the support of EPC-Geographis and other partner organizations to increase pace of rehabilitation and reconstruction process by providing relevant, reliable information to the people, organizations and Government.
• EPC-Geographis setup (with Abhiyan's Resources) and managed an information-processing unit with five Computer terminals networked with each other (LAN) with facility of Internet within a week after the earthquake. Since then EPC-Geographis personnel managed the unit. Eventually, EPC-Geographis mobilized more computers from an information technology firm based at Ahmedabad (Applitech Solution Ltd.) for GIS data processing and set up GIS facility at the information center. Abhiyan invested resources to buy a plotter and EPC-Geographis began processing the data that is being collected on the GIS platform. The type of data, which was available in Information center, included
  
  - Base Data on Employment, Shelter, Rehabilitation, Health, Debris Management
  - Damage Assessment
  - Relief Material Required
  - Details of NGOs involved in Relief and Rehabilitation Process
  - Availability of Relief Material
  - Details of Surveys carried out by various Government and Private Agencies
  

3. Preparation of GIS based Database and Linking with Maps

• EPC-Geographis personnel involved in the process of data collection by designing the data formats for collecting the data from the affected villages.
• Data collected at the village level was compiled and linked to the village boundary map to produce various thematic maps. This process was carried out as per the requirement of various relief agencies e.g. Janvikas, an Ahmedabad based NGO involved in rehabilitation of only dalit families of Surendranagar, Banaskantha and Patan districts.