It was Oct 10, 2005 — two days after the earthquake struck — when I reached Manshera with the relief team of the Pakistan Medical Association.
Our first stop was the Kid’s Blood Disease Organisation (KBDO) hospital at Shahnawaz Chowk in Mansehra. There were anaesthetists, gynaecologists, orthopaedic surgeons, general surgeons, physicians and voluntary medical students in our team. Landing at the Islamabad airport, we took a wagon to reach Mansehra, along with the volunteers of the Taraqi Foundation.
It was a long journey; we had already heard that a big building had collapsed in Islamabad but between Abbottabad and Mansehra we saw many damaged buildings — some of which were totally destroyed.
At that time there was very little traffic and nobody knew the actual extent of destruction caused by the earthquake. We saw distressed and tense faces everywhere and witnessed panic whenever there was an aftershock, which is a normal phenomenon after an earthquake of this magnitude.
In Mansehra, we came to know that the road to Muzaffarabad was closed and that Pakistan Army was working to open the main road.
We also came to know that Balakot had been totally destroyed. We met people from Abbotabad who told us that injured people were flooding the medical college hospital which was not able to cope with the number of patients.
A search for shrouds
In Mansehra, we saw an influx of people coming to find shelter, all of whom related tales of destruction and suffering.
The Abbottabad hospital was functional but there were many cracks on the hospital’s structure and there were fears that parts of the hospital may collapse soon. We saw doctors, nurses and paramedics working with fear in their eyes without the medical supplies needed for this kind of mega disaster.
Faisal Edhi of the Edhi Foundation told me that when Abdul Sattar Edhi heard about the earthquake, he instructed that all Edhi ambulances in Punjab and NWFP (now Khyber Pakhtunkwa) should be sent to the earthquake affected areas, filled with as much wheat flour and kafan cloth as possible.
It was a very wise decision; within two days we started seeing people desperately looking for kafan (shroud) cloth for the bodies removed from the debris. Balakot was totally ravaged and it took many many days to remove the dead bodies and in many places mass graves were dug for the putrefied bodies.
The Edhi foundation started distribution of flour, different kind of lentils and cooking oil, along with clean drinking water. In a very short time, Edhi volunteers were able to set up their network in the majority of the affected areas. They also brought small inflatable boats which were used to transport victims and food supplies on the rivers.
Volunteers were coming from every part of the country to help earthquake victims. Pakistani doctors from Canada, UK and the USA arrived with supplies and erected field hospitals and started performing procedures and operations on injured patients.
A big setup was established in Balakot by the volunteers of Midland Doctors Association, UK. A huge number of volunteers from Cuba, Turkey and the UAE also started relief work in disaster-affected areas.
Contributions from national and international NGOs started pouring in and people from all over the world sent their donations to the Government of Pakistan.
At the same time, we were shocked to hear that when the road to Muzaffarabad was opened after the second day of the earthquake, an organised group of people ransacked collapsed houses and cars on the roads in and around Muzaffarabad.
There were reported cases of kidnapping of young victims of the earthquake. Girls who had lost their parents in the disaster were smuggled to other parts of country and sold for prostitution. We also came to know that medical equipment, medicines, blankets, and tents stolen or looted from trucks and containers were also being smuggled to different parts of the country to be sold in the open market.
Very soon, the government rightly banned the travelling of children, especially girls, from the earthquake-affected areas. Check posts were established to inspect all trucks and vehicles leaving the area. We also witnessed massive corruption in the distribution of materials for the earthquake victims.
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, October 4th, 2015
http://www.dawn.com/
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