BALAKOT

A PAKISTANI CHARACTER (3)

THROUGH THE RUINS IN BALAKOT

It was clear, shining and quite early morning of the October. There was a little chill in the air but not so as to become biting. I was out of the house going to the river Kunhar. Suddenly it seemed to me that the earth had let loose all its dark forces. The valley seemed like a little canoe moving up and down in the rough ocean. The hill in front of me moved violently and it seemed to me that it was coming over me. Many huge boulders of stone were thrown over and they began falling down into the river. The hills on Shugran side were completely routed out and came falling down from the precipice. The wave came and went and then another came. It made such a noise that the widing road was straightened before my very eyes. The market that was in the middle of the town and it was about half kilometer long was razed to the ground and dust was making clouds over the town. All of a sudden a big boulder fell down in the river in front of me and water splashed up and drenched me completely. On the right of me there came the sound of a big band and the tall minaret of the mosque came down right in the middle of the river. Then there appeared a wider crack in the earth before my eyes on the other side of the river and instantly the school building of three rooms vanished in with children in it. There arose a cloud of dust and the crack narrowed in a moment. I heard the shrieks of the children and cries of three teachers who were standing in the lawn of the school and they fell down on the ground. In just seconds the edges of the crack met and it seemed there never had been a crack. I saw those teachers looking hither and thither in disbelief. They were completely speechless and looking aghast at this sudden out break of such a terrible shaking of the earth. I was myself speechless and just looked around me thinking nothing. Perhaps my mind had left me there.

For few minutes I hardly could understand anything as to what was happening. It seemed that the Day of Judgment had arrived then as it was told in the Holy Quran. It was the same picture as I had imagined while reciting Sura Qarea. Then I looked on my back and my mouth remained as open as I opened it to yawn. The whole city was in complete rubbles. Except one or two buildings and the mausoleums of Hazrat Ahmad Shaheed there was nothing which could be called a standing structure.

I remembered my family. All of us were having their breakfast. I came out just five minutes as was my habit to have a walk on the river. Our house was just a few meters away from the bank of the river. Surely in such rubble none could have escaped the falling death. I threw away my brushing twig and rushed to my home. It took me more than quarter of an hour to locate my house. It was because all signs and streets were completely razed to the ground. I just recognized from the bricks and mortar. My house was no more there. I felt that the world had come to an end. There was my wife, and my dear daughter. Undoubtedly they were dead. There were two sons, beautiful and jolly sons of my brother and wife of my younger brother. All were dead and perhaps dying if luckily they had been come under the cover of some falling wall. But it was my guess which proved wrong later. When I turned back I saw my old mother looking at me with her vacant eyes full of tears. She was wailing. But how could I console her? There was nothing left on which I could build my ideas to make her hopeful. I tried to ask her about the father and others but she was only wailing and wailing till her voice grew husky. She fell down on her knees. I supported by shouldering here and brought her out of the ruins on the river bacn. I aught that I was myself unable to walk further but there was none left to support me. Then I saw a dusty figure coming to me out of the ruins. When he came close I recognized I remembered that he was Shaukat. He was barber in the market and had trimmed my beard several times. Now he was bleeding and crying in front of my eyes. When I asked him, he only signaled to me that none of his family member is out of the rubble. I looked to the sky; it was now dim, though it should have been bright. Yesterday it was so bright. But the dust of the rubble had now clouded it and eclipsed the sun as well.
I compared myself to him and I felt a bit consolation that at least we were two alive. This was the only bit of heartening. I again went to my house and stood there on the rubble. The heavy structure of mortar had buried everything. It was so heavy that I tried my best but could not move it an inch further. I looked here and there for a shovel to break it but where was the shovel? There was nothing except bricks, broken plaster and some iron bars that were peeping out of the rubble. A thought came into my mind. I bent that iron bar and it turned downwards. Then I tried it several times up and down and after one hour it was snapped and came into my hand but had taken its toll. It had bruised my palm severely and a trail of blood was coming out. I stood up and looked around once more. One or two more distant neighbors were standing on their ruins. Their eyes seemed red but dry. They were looking at me as thought trying to recognize me. I called for them but nobody came. Everyone there had his own ruins to take care of them and their dear ones buried in them. I little thought about the outside world. My in-laws were living in Mansehra and they might have been in the rubble, too. Even if they were alive, they could not reach me.

Suddenly I saw a trail of blood seeping out of the floor near the kitchen. There the cemented structure had a crack. I tried to lift it and succeeded to some extent. When I lifted it up enough to look down, I was horrified and speechless to see that the dead body of my wife was terribly mutilated. She was crushed under the heavy debris. Her face was downward and head was fractured. Blood was oozing out of all of her body. I lifted the structure further and tried to pull out the body. It was trapped under the second piece. Then I lift the second one and was able to retrieve the body after half an hour. My wife, my dear wife was dead with my daughter. I began to wail and cry. Before that I had half hope now that was gone. She was dead in my hands. Then the thought of others death came to my and shocked me.

In the meanwhile the sun reached its highest point but I was quite indifferent to its soothing warmness. At about one’s clock, there came two helicopters from the army and some of soldiers came down. Till their arrival we had excavated some dead bodies. Now the air was full of the smell of blood and occasional cries of the survivors for their dead ones. After half an hour more soldiers came and we were a bit hopeful that our dead ones would get appropriate burial after all. More and more soldiers came. Four of them came to me and offered me some biscuits, for which I told them and I was not feeling hungry. They were equipped with hammers, shovels, and spades. Then they set to break and lift the structure. After the hard struggle of four hours, they took out all the dead bodies of my family and none of them survived. It grew dark then and the soldiers readily erected a makeshift camp where we were given food but who needed it. In my street, out of more than two hundred only twenty two survived and them there were only two women. One was my mother and other was my right side neighbour’s daughter. We sat down in the army tent. The darkness had made the atmosphere more sorrowful. Only ten hours ago all the denizens of the city was alive and kicking and now they were under the deadly rubble. What a change! None of us had imagined this scale of devastation at night or yesterday. We had never thought that death could strike such a heavy blow and that too, to the whole city. When the darkness had fully enveloped, almost all the inmates of the tent grew restless for the dead bodies were lying outside in the open. Soon after having tea with the soldiers took us with them and led collective funeral of the bodies. We set to dig graves and I had a lot of work to do that was to dig six graves. With full strength and extreme grief I buried two bodies but till morning I was still left with the remaining four. I rested a little after having breakfast with the soldiers. They were tired more than us. The reason was that they were fewer and there was the whole city before them. They were doing what they could. Much delay was creating a terrible stench. The air was getting foul due to smell of human blood. More soldiers were pouring there. I again began digging the third grave. Till noon, there were left two bodies and enough soldiers had arrived. But the scale of the devastation was so large that still they seemed less.
Then I felt giddy and little bit hungry. I put down my shovel and went to the tent. There were many children who were wounded and women as well. They were being treated there. Every where I saw soldiers displacing mortar structures and bricks to recover the bodies. In the tent there were Turkish biscuits and halve. I ate a little and bracing myself against a blanket closed my eyes. My mother was sleeping deeply. Perhaps such a great sorrow had made here sleepy to forget it for the time being.
When I had a little rest the soldiers came and called me to bury the remaining two. I looked at the innocent and somewhat mutilated faces of my nephews and their whole playful past reflected into my eyes. They I lowered covered their faces and weeping lowered them in their graves to sleep for ever. When I came back my mother was still sleeping.
I sat there with the blanket. I thought of many things as not to have happened. It was the first night after the earthquake. I sat there thinking over the fate of many orphans and widows and widowers and myself. Thinking made me sleepy as well and I soon went into the valley of dreams.
Next day the sun rose but it was still not full clear. There was still dust in the air. The body recovering activities of the soldiers continued for the whole night. In the meanwhile my mother also got up and breakfasted with me. I came out of the ten, and saw heaps of clothes, food items, blankest and biscuits. The world had opened up its treasures to keep us warm, our tummies full and our taste satisfied. But what about our soul, the emptiness, the void that our dear ones left behind them? How could we come to terms with life so swiftly while the graves were still fresh before us? Second day passed in helping my dead frieds in their burials and some alive ones in burying their dear ones. We watched coming of lines of trucks full of all kind of things. It seemed that the country had opened up its purses. There was no shortage of anything. But there were none to relish them.

On the third day I though about my in-laws living in Mansehra and I was told by a soldier that the city was all right. I and my mother requested them to take us with them if they were going and they accepted it. We reached Mansehra through an army jeep in the same after noon. On the way I saw thousands of cars, jeeps,buses and trucks full of goods. There were volunteers who were going to help the victims. I felt happy that the city was safe and we went straight to our relatives. They were saddened to know that six had gone under the earth and were happy the were saved. They told that they tried to contact us but there was no contact of any kind. Hence they had sent a man to find about this morning who would return in the evening and in the meanwhile we came to them.

We have seen the worst disaster and extreme grief. Nothing could be more sever than that. But the heartening thing was that my mother became optimistic saying that Pakistan had lost her love, her warmth and her motherly treatment for her inhabitants. We shall never forget love and support that we got during the trail. After all Pakistan is here and so we are.

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THAT IS ENOUHGH.