Tsunami Memorial Pillar

Inauguration of memorial exhibition

(26 Dec 2005) SHOTLIST
1. Wide of memorial
2. Low angle of memorial
3. Close up of clock with its hands stopped at 09:17, the time when tsunami struck last year
4. Close up of commemorative plaque
5. Wide of damaged boat, recovered after tsunami
6. Close up of eternal flame
7. District official, J Radhakrishnan cutting the ribbon to open exhibition
8. Radhakrishnan laying wreath at base of memorial
9. Close up of wreath with children around it
10. SOUNDBITE (English) J Radhakrishnan, District Official:
The park actually is more: one: a memorial with, you know, whatever we have recovered from that area plus, you know, commemorating the 6,065 lives lost. But more importantly, it is the disaster awareness, tsunami awareness messages are there - how to react. And then we are also administering an oath in all the 424 panchayats (sub-divisions) here on how to react to a tragedy, disaster, how an individual can contribute to preventing loss of lives and also preventing loss of property.
11. Two boys planting a sapling; each sapling represents one life lost in the tsunami
12. Policemen and government officials observing silence
13. Policewomen observing silence
14. Women observing silence
15. Radhakrishnan saying oath with citizens
16. Citizens taking oath
17. Wide of people gathered at memorial
STORYLINE
People gathered in India's Nagapattinam district on Monday to watch the unveiling of a memorial marking the first anniversary of the Asian tsunami disaster.
Items recovered from the devastation caused by the tsunami are also on display in the park where the memorial is located.
These include a clock which stopped at the time the tsunami struck, a pillar engraved with India's national emblem and a boat.
Nagapattinam's top administrator, J Radhakrishnan, inaugurated the memorial and park.
He said the park was not just meant to be a commemorative area but was also meant to create disaster awareness.
During the inauguration ceremony, six thousand and 65 saplings were planted, one to remember each of the district's victims.
Those at the ceremony also observed a minute's silence in memory of the dead before repeating an oath on disaster management.
Nagapattinam district was the most badly affected area in the country, where more than 10-thousand people were killed in the tsunami.


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Tsunami at Nagapattinam

Tsunami , december, 26, 2004