02-22-2006, 11:49 PM
PoK quake victims must be rehabilitated soon
By Samuel Baid |
The earthquake-affected people in occupied Kashmir and the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) of Pakistan have faced the worst of winter fury in past four months without adequate shelter, food and clothing.
But the coming summer may not bring much cheers to them if pucca dwellings are not made for them before the onslaught of monsoon, which bring in their wake devastating floods and landslides. Discuss: Corrupt officers will further victimise PoK quake victims
The United Nations has estimated that the October 8 earthquake uprooted 40 lakh people. To rehabilitate such a big number before the monsoons will certainly be an uphill task. Lt.Gen. Mehmud Nasir, who is in charge of reconstruction, said last month that the Government planned to start construction of houses in April.
But that would require one billion dollars, he said. The international donors, who had pledged about six billion dollars to Pakistan at a meeting in Islamabad on November 19, are now dragging their feet.
Till last month, Pakistan had received only 5 per cent of the pledged money. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan sent George W Bush senior as his special envoy to different countries to remind them of their pledge. The UN has also appealed to oil producing countries to help in relief work.
Even if all or most of the pledged money comes, the basic problem will be that of management and credibility. In the past four months the relief work has been very disorganised. Despite the flood of tents, tin sheets and other relief material from within Pakistan and abroad, only 25 to 30 per cent affectees could get shelters. For more columns CLICK HERE
Most tents collapsed under rain and snow. There are allegations that the Army itself grabbed good quality tents and other relief material. That is the reason why the opposition parties kept away from the relief work.
The idea of tin sheets came much later when children, old and injured people began dying of pneumonia and other diseases. But even tin sheets reached only a small percentage of the people.
As the fury of rain and snow increased in December-January, the Government decided to first provide shelter to people living at the height of 5000 ft or above. Head of the Relief Committee of occupied Kashmir Malik Nawaz said 40,000 tents given to these people could not stand heavy rain and snow.
It is not known how many survivors of the quake died because of rain and snow. Malik Nawaz's statement did not tally with the claim of Federal Relief Commissioner Maj.Gen. Farooq Ahmed Khan.
The latter had claimed on December 23 that 2,13,000 houses had been built in areas, which were at the height of 5000 ft or above.
The Pakistan Government had first decided to pay Rs.25,000 to the owners of each house destroyed by the quake. The idea was that each owner would retrieve some material from the debris of his destroyed house and build one room to protect himself and his family from rain and snow.
This was a very unrealistic scheme. First of all, as recipients complained, Rs.25,000 was too little even to clear the debris. General Pervez Musharraf then raised it to Rs.1.75 lakh per owner.
Lt.Gen. Mehmud Nasir said the recipient of this amount would be given a design of a one-bed room house to be built in an area of 400 sq.ft. He said the construction would be done under the supervision of Army engineers.
The second unrealistic aspect of this scheme is that the military government for the sake of its own convenience, is willing to give compensation only to the owner of a destroyed house, where as the realistic position was that under one roof the house owner and his many tenant families lived at the time of the quake.
It seems the Government has no scheme of rehabilitating lakhs of uprooted people who had lived reasonably good life but owned no property. They lived as tenants. Maj.Gen. Farooq Ahmed insists that the compensation would be given on the basis of the houses destroyed and not on the basis of number of families rendered shelterless by the quake.
But even this policy cannot be executed flawlessly. According to reports, land ownership records have been destroyed in the quake and the Army has not made a count of destroyed houses. This means now everything will depend on the memory, as also the goodwill of Patwaris.
This leaves the door open for large-scale corruption in the matter of fixation of compensation. The Army, which has earned a bad name for land grabbing in Punjab, NWFP and Balochistan, may grab prime land in occupied Kashmir also with the help of obliging Patwaris.
The epicentre of the October 8 quake was near Muzaffarabad, the capital city of occupied Kashmir, 10 km below the ground. In January this year, media published a survey report prepared by Chinese and Pakistani seismologists warning of underground cracks in occupied Kashmir.
The report advised the people not to build houses near rivers and get a seismographic survey done of the area before starting the construction. If this report is taken seriously, the selection of land for constructing new houses and other buildings will be a difficult task.
It is said there are still houses and school buildings from the rubbles of which dead bodies have not been extricated. People on their own try to move heavy concrete debris to try to pull out their dead near and dear ones. Two months ago they found a woman still alive under the rubble of a house.
According to Government's revised estimates, more than 82,000 people died in the quake. But it is still not known how many more died in the sub-zero temperature.
By Samuel Baid |
The earthquake-affected people in occupied Kashmir and the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) of Pakistan have faced the worst of winter fury in past four months without adequate shelter, food and clothing.
But the coming summer may not bring much cheers to them if pucca dwellings are not made for them before the onslaught of monsoon, which bring in their wake devastating floods and landslides. Discuss: Corrupt officers will further victimise PoK quake victims
The United Nations has estimated that the October 8 earthquake uprooted 40 lakh people. To rehabilitate such a big number before the monsoons will certainly be an uphill task. Lt.Gen. Mehmud Nasir, who is in charge of reconstruction, said last month that the Government planned to start construction of houses in April.
But that would require one billion dollars, he said. The international donors, who had pledged about six billion dollars to Pakistan at a meeting in Islamabad on November 19, are now dragging their feet.
Till last month, Pakistan had received only 5 per cent of the pledged money. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan sent George W Bush senior as his special envoy to different countries to remind them of their pledge. The UN has also appealed to oil producing countries to help in relief work.
Even if all or most of the pledged money comes, the basic problem will be that of management and credibility. In the past four months the relief work has been very disorganised. Despite the flood of tents, tin sheets and other relief material from within Pakistan and abroad, only 25 to 30 per cent affectees could get shelters. For more columns CLICK HERE
Most tents collapsed under rain and snow. There are allegations that the Army itself grabbed good quality tents and other relief material. That is the reason why the opposition parties kept away from the relief work.
The idea of tin sheets came much later when children, old and injured people began dying of pneumonia and other diseases. But even tin sheets reached only a small percentage of the people.
As the fury of rain and snow increased in December-January, the Government decided to first provide shelter to people living at the height of 5000 ft or above. Head of the Relief Committee of occupied Kashmir Malik Nawaz said 40,000 tents given to these people could not stand heavy rain and snow.
It is not known how many survivors of the quake died because of rain and snow. Malik Nawaz's statement did not tally with the claim of Federal Relief Commissioner Maj.Gen. Farooq Ahmed Khan.
The latter had claimed on December 23 that 2,13,000 houses had been built in areas, which were at the height of 5000 ft or above.
The Pakistan Government had first decided to pay Rs.25,000 to the owners of each house destroyed by the quake. The idea was that each owner would retrieve some material from the debris of his destroyed house and build one room to protect himself and his family from rain and snow.
This was a very unrealistic scheme. First of all, as recipients complained, Rs.25,000 was too little even to clear the debris. General Pervez Musharraf then raised it to Rs.1.75 lakh per owner.
Lt.Gen. Mehmud Nasir said the recipient of this amount would be given a design of a one-bed room house to be built in an area of 400 sq.ft. He said the construction would be done under the supervision of Army engineers.
The second unrealistic aspect of this scheme is that the military government for the sake of its own convenience, is willing to give compensation only to the owner of a destroyed house, where as the realistic position was that under one roof the house owner and his many tenant families lived at the time of the quake.
It seems the Government has no scheme of rehabilitating lakhs of uprooted people who had lived reasonably good life but owned no property. They lived as tenants. Maj.Gen. Farooq Ahmed insists that the compensation would be given on the basis of the houses destroyed and not on the basis of number of families rendered shelterless by the quake.
But even this policy cannot be executed flawlessly. According to reports, land ownership records have been destroyed in the quake and the Army has not made a count of destroyed houses. This means now everything will depend on the memory, as also the goodwill of Patwaris.
This leaves the door open for large-scale corruption in the matter of fixation of compensation. The Army, which has earned a bad name for land grabbing in Punjab, NWFP and Balochistan, may grab prime land in occupied Kashmir also with the help of obliging Patwaris.
The epicentre of the October 8 quake was near Muzaffarabad, the capital city of occupied Kashmir, 10 km below the ground. In January this year, media published a survey report prepared by Chinese and Pakistani seismologists warning of underground cracks in occupied Kashmir.
The report advised the people not to build houses near rivers and get a seismographic survey done of the area before starting the construction. If this report is taken seriously, the selection of land for constructing new houses and other buildings will be a difficult task.
It is said there are still houses and school buildings from the rubbles of which dead bodies have not been extricated. People on their own try to move heavy concrete debris to try to pull out their dead near and dear ones. Two months ago they found a woman still alive under the rubble of a house.
According to Government's revised estimates, more than 82,000 people died in the quake. But it is still not known how many more died in the sub-zero temperature.