Voices from ALNAP’s first 25 years | Mihir Bhatt: “ALNAP is a very careful listener. It picks up low volume, distant murmurs and adds the issues from the murmur to the agenda”

Mihir Bhatt, Director at All India Disaster Mitigation Institute (AIDMI) and deputy leader of the Tsunami Evaluation Coalition on his involvement with ALNAP as the director of a member organisation. Read more testimonials from our 'Voices from ALNAP's first 25 years' blog series.

ALNAP is a very careful listener. It picks up low volume, distant murmurs and before you know it, it adds the issues from the murmur to the agenda. AIDMI has used ALNAP's platform to raise issues in a global forum in this manner from time to time.
 
The Tsunami Evaluation Coalition (TEC) following the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami is one such example. AIDMI was one of the first to point out that it would be overwhelming to the local authorities and communities to have multiple evaluations happening simultaneously. Imagine one coastal village visited by over two dozen evaluators from various agencies. AIDMI had seen this chaos during the 2001 Gujarat earthquake (Disaster Emergency Committee, DEC UK) evaluation it steered with Tony Vaux. AIDMI called for a joint evaluation, a concept that ALNAP had developed some years earlier, and the request was taken seriously. 

The TEC report has permanently changed the way evaluations are done.

With ALNAP, AIDMI brought together a large coalition of UN agencies, national governments, international NGOs, local NGOs, and key communities and others to evaluate the tsunami response work. It was a huge exercise: six countries, 23 international agencies, and at least 400 local project partners. The TEC report has permanently changed the way evaluations are done. Together with the WHO, IFRC, AIDMI, DfID, UNDP, UNOCHA, UNICEF, SDC, NORAD, MFA, IOB/MFA, Danida, CIDA, BMZ, AusAid, JICA/MoFA, and others AIDMI pushed for a far greater focus on accountability, especially to people who are affected by crisis; on livelihood relief; and women’s leadership in recovery.

Each [ALNAP] meeting is a world of new ideas, expert individuals, and encouragement.

AIDMI has been a member of ALNAP since its second meeting, and has participated in most annual meetings since. Each meeting is a world of new ideas, expert individuals, and encouragement.

ALNAP resources are public goods.

As a result, AIDMI has benefitted immensely in making its work more contextualised in global policy opportunities. ALNAP resources are public goods, and AIDMI has used them in a wide range of ways: to inform local project work and policy changes; for research and evaluation work; and for training and capacity building at local level.

[The State of the Humanitarian System] reports have made the whole system more accurately aware of who we are, where we perform well and where we do not.

AIDMI also contributes to ALNAP. We have worked with or advised on most of the State of the Humanitarian System reports, for example. These reports have made the whole system more accurately aware of who we are, where we perform well and where we do not. Similarly, our institute most recently helped with ALNAP’s ‘Lessons Learned’ paper on heatwaves, listing key action areas that we have learned are effective.

AIDMI has twice jointly hosted ALNAP in India to guide a focus on the theme of affected populations in Delhi with the Prime Minister’s office participating, and on the theme of urban area planning in Chennai with over six national authorities from South Asia participating. As a result, AIDMI has been a guest of ALNAP as well as a host.
 
There’s a Gujarati language saying, ‘ek dooje ke liye’, which translates into English as ‘made for each other’. I think ALNAP and AIDMI are made for each other. What ALNAP needs AIDMI has, and what AIDMI needs, ALNAP has.