Wednesday, December 29 2004 18:30 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: The Government today (Dec 29, 2004) said in the absence of the required instrumentation it was not possible to give an early warning on the Tsunami that caused destruction in the coastal areas but now it will install "deep ocean assessment and reporting system" to know of such situations in advance.

"It is not necessary that Tsunamis will be there in the event of an earthquake. In the history there have been many earthquakes which have not caused any Tsunamis," Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal told reporters reacting to allegations that Government could not warn the coastal areas on time.

"No Government thought of it...the last recorded Tsunami has been in 1883. It was not in the horizon of our thoughts. Besides, Tsunamis are not seen in ocean and these gain height only when they approach the shore," he said.

Though the authorities knew of the earthquake that hit Sumatra at 6.29 hrs (IST), they could not assess that it would cause Tsunamis, which hit Indian coast after about 2.5 hours, he said.

However, Government has now decided to install 10-12 "deep ocean assessment and reporting systems" and would also co-ordinate with the Pacific Tsunamic Warning Centre to learn from their experience, he said. The cost of the system would be about Rs 100-125 crore.

But, he said, the country would not join the 26 Pacific rim countries which are part of an international network as their system is installed only in the Pacific Ocean. Scientists would also prepare a software which would use virtual reality to gauge the sequence of events in such a situation, he said.