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| October 20, 2005 | Thursday | Ramzan 15, 1426 |
Of selfless volunteers and selfish custodians
ISLAMABAD, Oct 19: Volunteers, young men and women, who worked day and night at the collapsed Margalla Towers site to save lives proved to be the real stars in this hour of tragedy and trial.
These unsung heroes kept hope alive and gave strength to many families and friends of the victims.
The search and rescue operation was conducted almost entirely by volunteers, local and foreign, who knew their job but could only half do it because of questionable quality of supervision. One could notice that the search and rescue was an operation of the volunteers. Armymen were there to ‘supervise’ it and the police officials to ‘maintain public order’ with the additional responsibility of preparing cold statistics of the victims.
Being an eyewitness to the search and rescue operation at the Margalla Towers site from the first day, one could not but notice that the operation, meant to save lives, was ill coordinated with no civilian authority in control.
In sharp contrast to the weather-beaten volunteers in heavily soiled clothes, joggers, gloves, helmets and arm bandages, the stiff-necked uniformed men stood there in their spotless starched fatigues with only some dust showing on their bulky boots. Most of them stood there almost aimlessly, every now and then shooing away people to the prescribed limits.
At the time of Sehr and Iftar, the men in uniform would be the first to declare war on food and drinks made available through the courtesy of private individuals or concerns. Volunteers remained at the serving end.
At one point a couple of army officers at site were also heard complaining that whenever a natural calamity hit the country, floods or earthquakes, it was the military force that was dispatched to the disaster zones.
Even sitting at a safe distance from the site the baton-toting uniformed men of police and army wore face masks, some double to protect themselves from dust, smoke and stench. It was the volunteers who risked their lives searching through the hostile debris and pulled out injured survivors and dead bodies or limbs of the victims.
Notably not a single army man on duty touched a dead body or a survivor. Even the British rescue workers who provided valuable technical support mostly kept away from the bodies.
Late Saturday night when rain and winds lashed the city the armymen and police at site were the first to dash inside a nearby apartment building to take shelter. It was left to the volunteers to manage the flying tents with medicines and relief goods.
To top it all, the CDA staff had also disappeared on Sunday and there was no one to remove the garbage and litter scattered all over the place. The police and army personnel had moved in hundreds when the building collapsed but they came with nothing but their batons, guns and rifles. Basic kits for rescue workers including helmets, gloves and face masks were provided all by private individuals.
In fact it was from volunteers that the army and police also took the masks and other required stuff.
One concern expressed on Tuesday was that valuables including jewellery and cash retrieved from the debris may have been pocketed away. One volunteer said he saw a briefcase being camouflaged and taken away.
It is clear that the bulk of rescue work was done by the civilian volunteers who got all the required implements on public donations. So what then was the role of the state or civil administration in this whole episode? This question remains unanswered.
Meanwhile, hats off to all the selfless volunteers who worked so tirelessly since the devastating October 8 earthquake. Islamabad thanks them all.
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