Earthquake relief on a war
footing By Zofeen T Ebrahim
KARACHI - The round-the-clock buzz of
activity on the tarmac of the Pakistan Air Force
(PAF) base here could be mistaken for war
mobilization. But the enemy is a Himalayan winter
setting down on the stunned survivors of
Saturday's earthquake which may have killed as
many as 100,000 people in disputed Kashmir.
"People say it's reminiscent of the spirit
of the people during the 1965 war [one of several
fought with India over Kashmir], I'd like to
call it the spirit of 2005, of
the here and now," said Sohail Ahmed, a popular
presenter of a radio show drumming up support for
the already massive relief operation here and in
the national capital of Islamabad.
Five
days after a powerful earthquake, touching 7.6 on
the Richter scale, devastated towns and villages
along the Line of Control (LoC) that separates the
Pakistan and Indian parts of Kashmir, aid and
relief were yet to reach thousands of survivors
cut off by massive landslides and foul weather in
the already difficult mountain terrain.
It
is a measure of the magnitude of the tragedy and
the logistical difficulties in Kashmir that Indian
soldiers were allowed to cross the heavily
fortified LoC, on Wednesday, to assist relief and
rescue operations in Pakistani villages and areas
that are more readily accessible from the Indian
side.
On Wednesday morning, an Indian Air
Force Ilyushin-76 transporter landed in Islamabad
carrying 25 tonnes of relief material including
blankets, tents, plastic sheeting, mattresses and
medicine in the first such consignment from a
country regarded as the enemy.
The two
countries, partitioned in 1947 into Islamic
Pakistan and Hindu majority India, have fought
several wars to gain full control over the former
princely state of Jammu and Kashmir - but their
armies have been more or less at a standstill
along the LoC.
The Indian plane could not
land initially because of the large number of
transporters from no less than 30 different
countries already on the runways that have been
flying in supplies for onward movement to Kashmir.
Relief material being pooled here and in
Islamabad are being flown across an "air bridge"
to Muzaffarabad, capital of Pakistani Kashmir,
where a tent city is taking shape to accommodate
some of the more than 2 million people estimated
to have been rendered homeless.
Muzaffarabad's airport can only
accommodate small aircraft and the sheer number of
injured people streaming in has allowed medical
teams to attend to only those needing urgent care
or have them flown to larger cities while others
are being turned away.
Field hospitals set
up in Muzaffarabad and in the Kashmir towns of
Bagh and Manshera are reportedly still unable to
cope as people are steadily being flown in by
helicopters or are trekking in. On Wednesday,
Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf
responded in a televised address to growing
criticism that timely aid had not been delivered
to the survivors.
"I am deeply saddened
that some people had to wait for days before aid
reached them," Musharraf said, adding that the
"tragedy was much bigger than the capacity and
capability of the government as a whole".
Musharraf said delays were caused by roads
leading to affected villages being blocked by
landslides but that help was on its way in the
shape of heavy lift helicopters moved by the US
Army from neighboring Afghanistan.
Criticism has also been directed at
Washington for not providing enough aid to its
ally in "war-against-terror" in Afghanistan next
door.
But the US has already diverted a
dozen helicopters from Afghanistan while other
countries have contributed at least 20 more to
augment the Pakistan Army's own fleet of 122
transport choppers.
There has, however,
been an unprecedented response from Pakistanis at
home and abroad after television channels showed
desperate people digging into rubble with bare
hands looking for people who may still be alive
and mothers clutching dead children still in
school uniforms.
"There is not a single
soul that has not been affected. I've never seen
this kind of emotional intensity among people. The
Ramadan has made the hearts softer, too, when
people usually are more charitable," said one
Karachi resident.
"I thought our
cell-phone toting youth were an indifferent lot,
just concerned about their self image and their
music. But they've proved me wrong. I've never
been so proud of being a Pakistani," says a
middle-aged woman, who had arrived at the PAF
along with her teenage son and daughter to
volunteer services.
Since day one, the PAF
Museum, one of five designated refugee camps, was
swarming with young volunteers bringing in
mountains of relief goods, including cartons of
milk, mineral water bottles, sacks of sugar,
flour, pulses, blankets, bedding, sweaters and
shrouds for the dead.
All over Karachi,
stalls set up by welfare organizations, are
bursting with essential goods - blankets, quilts,
cooking oil, sugar, bed sheets to be sent up to
the "front".
Relief cells have been set
up, for example, by the Edhi Foundation, South
Asia's largest private social service network
while TCS, a courier company is delivering relief
goods free of charge to the foundation.
The governor of Sindh province has set up
a relief cell at the governor's house. There are
aid camps set up by workers of political parties
like the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal which has
dispatched relief material and teams of medical
personnel to the affected areas by road.
The real task, which no one had foreseen,
lay in sorting out the mammoth piles of assorted
material at the PAF Museum and other collection
centers and this is where the services of the
young volunteers are coming in handy.
"I
didn't know what to do so I joined a human chain
and helped in loading the trucks," said Faisal
Qureshi, a young volunteer.
Numerous blood
collection camps have been set up by voluntary
organizations in places like shopping malls.
"There is a two-hour waiting period," said one
donor, who had gone to donate blood at one of the
camps soon after breaking her Ramadan fast.
The credit for this massive mobilization
of resources and manpower can be attributed to the
various private TV channels that are running
non-stop, phone-in programs.
"People call
from all over the country and abroad, asking where
and how they can donate - in cash or kind.
Television is no longer one-way communication,"
said one presenter who received calls from
Kashmir, with victims requesting human help, tents
and shrouds.
Another caller, a doctor from
the affected areas, asked for medicines for
combating diarrhoea, antibiotics, blood, syringes,
ice-boxes, bandages, plaster of paris and other
items.
The United Nations has warned of
the possibility of disease outbreak and, on
Tuesday, appealed for $272 million to cover
expenses over the next six months that would
include winter tents.
