The Bagh that was, and the one that will be

BAGH—Standing on a hill across the Mahal rivulet, one can see that nothing has changed in the ruined city of Bagh since Oct 8, 2005 when it tumbled down in barely three minutes. The minarets of mosques that previously dominated the landscape in the foothills of the mountains are nowhere to be seen. One year on, the scenic beauty that in the past characterised Bagh — which literally means “garden” — is no more.
A 100-plus-kanal playground of the postgraduate college where children used to play football and cricket or where students took part in national cadet course exercises is now a junkyard where international agencies store relief goods. A number of large warehouses have been established alongside a couple of tented classrooms where a pack of stray dogs can be seen roaming around at all times.
While reconstruction work has not started in Bagh, a clutch of problems — corruption, supply of substandard food and medicines, psychological disorders, etc — have plagued the city.
A ban has been placed on construction in and around the picturesque town because of the proximity of two active fault lines. A yet-to-be-approved master plan for urban Bagh will pave the way for reconstruction, but it is not likely to be in place before the onset of another killing winter. It appears that the slogan of “Build Back Better” will not reach Bagh, headquarters of one of the seven districts of Azad Kashmir, any time soon.
Next to Balakot and Muzaffarabad, Bagh district with a population of about 485,000 people was the worst hit by the Oct 2005 earthquake. More than 8,500 people were killed, 7,000 injured and over 90,000 houses were damaged. More than 500 families of the dead and over 1,500 injured are yet to be compensated as they complete a long year of suffering.
The death toll does not include the unknown number of armed forces personnel who were killed in Bagh’s three tehsils, including those stationed at the 6-AK Brigade headquarters that caved in soon after the deadly earthquake.
Bagh is believed to house the largest concentration of the armed forces, comprising regular army and the Mujahid Force. The loss of men in uniform deployed at LoC bunkers in high-altitude positions — Forward Kahuta, Chirikot, Hajipir and Sherotahara — has never come to public knowledge.
A major portion of the town — a 1947 launching pad for the liberation struggle against the Dogra raj and India — is now declared a “red zone”. The term is used for highly hazardous areas in the context of the earthquake. A small town on the ridge of Nala Mahal, Bagh, cannot be reconstructed at its original location because of the two active fault lines.
“Bagh has been divided into four zones: high hazardous, hazardous, high dangerous and medium dangerous. No part of it falls in the low-dangerous or safe categories,” says Mumtaz Kazmi, tehsil coordination officer. Its lorry station, postgraduate boys’ college, Nindrai and Maldara are on one fault line while District Headquarters, Huddabari, Chowki and the girls’ and boys’ schools are on the other fault line, he tells Dawn. The dwellers of 6-AK Brigade headquarters — now housing two brigades instead of one — have to live in tents and makeshift and prefabricated shelters. The 7-AK brigade was deployed there for rehabilitation. Also, there is no building to house a unit of AT (Animal Transport) Harighel.
The emergence of post-quake psychosocial problems has caused considerable disquiet in the devastated area but there is no psychiatrist in the whole district. According to the medical superintendent of the Bagh DHQ, Dr Atiq Zahid, depression and other psychological problems are very common.
“About 80 per cent of people have become abnormal. Sometimes I personally feel depressed,” he says.
The MS, who is currently on a 90-day leave to relax, says maternal mortality rate has increased after the earthquake due to lack of staff and gynecologists as well as trauma-related problems.
The earthquake completely demolished the 150-bed DHQ building. Medicine Sans Frontiers (MSF Belgium) has now developed a 60-bed hospital in air-conditioned containers that is to be upgraded to a nursing school in the next couple of years. The hospital is short of women doctors, gynecologists and specialists.
He says no effort was made to rehabilitate the earthquake victims on a sustainable basis by creating business opportunities for them. Instead, most people have consumed their compensation money by purchasing mobile phones and cars. The use of “charas” (hashish) has also become very common in Bagh, he says.
He confirms that the supply of substandard medicines and foodstuff by international organisations was at one time an issue in Bagh. Now, all supplies come directly from the AJK government and MSF Belgium.
Another health department official says that low-quality Indian toothpaste and World Food Programme biscuits meant for Iraq are still being provided to schoolchildren in Bagh.
Afaq Ahmad, a child specialist at the Bagh DHQ hospital, says food, nutrition and hygiene-related diseases are on the rise although no data is available. Likewise, cases of people being bitten by snakes, scorpions and other insects have increased.
In the rural areas of Bagh, reconstruction of houses is in full swing. In Bagh and adjoining areas, cement and steel bars are available to people at normal rates through official hubs but masons and labourers have doubled their daily charges.
Residents of Forward Kahuta, however, say a 50-kg bag of cement is being sold for Rs430 instead of Rs300 and in Bagh prices of steel bars have gone up in similar proportion. “It is very difficult for the people of far-flung areas to build a two-room house with Rs175,000,” says Latif who hails from Kahuta.
Complaints of corruption have marred the distribution of compensation money. Zahid, a security guard, says he was paid just Rs10,000 and was asked to sign a receipt for Rs25,000, which was supposed to be the first installment of compensation for his damaged house. When he complained to some former and sitting assembly members, he was advised not to make a hue and cry because he could then be deprived of the subsequent Rs150,000 installment.—Agencies