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The challenge of Balakot to save lives



Along with a group of faculty, staff and students from my university
in Islamabad, I journeyed to Balakot, close to the center of the
Kashmir earthquake. This mountainous town, situated on the banks of
the Kunhar River, has been destroyed. There is rubble and the
gut-wrenching smell of decaying corpses. The rats have it good; the
one I accidentally stepped upon was already fat. If there is a plan to
clear the concrete rubble in and around the town, nobody seems to have
any clue. But the Balakotis are taking it in their stride - nose masks
are everywhere.

But there is good news. We were just one of countless groups of
ordinary citizens on the move after the enormity of the earthquake on
Oct. 8 became apparent. The Mansehra to Balakot road, finally forced
open by huge army bulldozers, is now lined with relief trucks bursting
with supplies that were donated by people from across the country.
This is one of those rare times that I have seen Pakistan's people
feel and move together as a nation. Even the armed bandits who waylay
relief supplies - making necessary a guard of soldiers with automatic
weapons, standing every few hundred yards - cannot destroy this moment.

Islamic groups from across the country have also arrived. Some bring
relief supplies; others simply harangue those who have lost loved ones
and their livelihood, lecturing that their misdeeds brought about this
catastrophe. No one seems to have an explanation for why God's wrath
was especially directed at mosques, madrassas, and schools - all of
which collapsed in huge numbers. No one says why thousands of the
faithful have been buried alive in this sacred month of fasting.

Aid from across the world is making its way towards the destruction,
and the United States is here too. Double-bladed Chinook helicopters,
diverted from fighting al-Qaida in Afghanistan, now fly over the
heartland of jihad and the militant training camps in Mansehra to drop
food and tents a few kilometers beyond. Temporarily birds of peace
instead of war, they do immensely more to calm angry Islamists than
the reams of glossy propaganda put out by the U.S. information
services in Pakistan.

Their visibility makes relief choppers terrific propaganda, for better
or for worse. This is undoubtedly why the Pakistani government refused
an Indian offer to send in helicopters for relief work in and around
Muzzafarabad, the flattened capital of Pakistani-administered Kashmir.
Sadly, in spite of a much celebrated peace process, Pakistan refuses
visas to Indian peace groups and activists that seek to help in the
relief effort. It is still not too late to open this door and let
Pakistanis, Indians and Kashmiris help each other.

The challenges are many. The aid remains too little. There are not
enough tents, blankets, and warm clothes to go around. Hundreds of
tent clusters have gone up, but thousands of families remain out under
the skies, facing rain and hail, and with dread in their hearts. These
families have lost everything but the tattered clothes on their backs.
Some even lost the land they had lived upon for generations - the top
soil simply slid away, leaving behind hard rock and rubble.

Worst of all, aid is not reaching those most affected. Hundreds of
destroyed communities are scattered deep in the mountains. We saw
helicopters attempt aerial drops; landing is impossible in most
places. But people told us that they often miss and the supplies land
up thousands of feet or below in deep forests. Distribution is
haphazard and uncoordinated, done with little thought. We saw relief
workers throw packets of food and clothes from the top of trucks,
causing a riot. Hustlers thrive, the weak watch passively.

The clock is ticking. In two months, the mountains will get their
first snowfall and temperatures will plummet below zero. Millions may
have been made homeless. Those without shelter will die. Tents will
not do.

From a special university fund, we pledged to rebuild the homes of a
dozen families. But 10,000 or more families will need homes in the
Mansehra-Balakot-Kaghan area alone, not to speak of adjoining Kashmir.
The task of saving lives has barely begun.

For me personally, there is a sense of deja vu. Nearly 31 years ago,
on Dec. 25, 1974, a powerful earthquake flattened towns along the
Karakorum Highway and killed nearly 10,000 people. I traveled with a
university team into the same mountains for similar relief work. Prime
Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto had made a passionate appeal for funds
around the world, had taken a token helicopter trip to the destroyed
town of Besham, and then made fantastic promises of relief and
rehabilitation.

Hundreds of millions of dollars in relief funds received from abroad
mysteriously disappeared. Some well-informed people believe that those
funds were used to kick off Pakistan's secret nuclear program.

Will today's government do better? This will only be assured if
citizens organize themselves to play a more direct role in relief and
rehabilitation for the long term. Civil society groups must now assert
themselves. They must demand a voice in planning and implementing the
reconstruction effort and, along with international donors,
transparency and public auditing of where aid is spent.

Pervez Hoodbhoy is a professor at Quaid-e-Azam University in
Islamabad. - Ed.