chennai taking lessons from the 2015 december floods and last years cyclone vardah the state government has decided to have its own exclusive battalion tamil nadu disaster response force on the lines of national disaster response force the plan is to engage a highly trained team of about 1000 personnel to access vulnerable locations either for prepositioning or during sudden occurrence teams are expected to be positioned in more than two cities other than chennai so as to cover the entire region making a suo motu announcement in the assembly palaniswami said the state government had taken up rescue and relief operations in coordination with various agencies the state also coordinates with the ndrf when disaster range is much higher there is a need to have a separate force that knows how to respond to disaster immediately reach out to affected people and take up relief measures without any further delay in a bid to strengthen sdrf and take up relief operations instantly the tamil nadu disaster response force will be set up the cm said capacity building and equipment will cost rs 15 crore to the exchequer currently the revenue administration engages a battalion of 100 men and women commandoes under the aegis of state disaster response force sdrf who work in tandem with ndrf during emergencies a police officer in the rank of additional directorgeneral of police commando force wing is heading the sdrf team the commandos of the sdrf receive annual training at the ndrf centre in arakonam and hyderabad but disaster management authorities felt the number was not satisfactory given the rise in number of disasters natural and manmade the state has been subjected to in recent yearswe will see a minimum of 1000 personnel getting trained by ndrf to attend to all types of disasters they will be provided with necessary sophisticated stateoftheart equipment revenue administration disaster management and mitigation commissioner k satyagopal said while the existing strength is insufficient the government had to train personnel for the northeast monsoon preparedness while the state depend upon the central forces in emergency mobilization and logistics become difficult as was seen during the 2015 december floods satyagopal said having a battalion would mean bulk of the work being handled by people who are wellversed with the terrain community language culture and topographythe services of the sdrf personnel came to the fore during december floods and cyclone vardah which wreaked havoc in the three northern districts of chennai kancheepuram and tiruvallur the sdrf team also assisted the ndrf teams during the 11storey building collapse at moulivakkam on june 28 2014 that killed 61 construction workers the sdrf team owns two boats which they used to rescue people stranded during the floods in 2015 chief minister palaniswami also announced allocation of rs 524 crore towards purchase of equipment for communication search and rescue operations by government departments including greater chennai corporation metrowater public works department and highways