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| October 22, 2005 | Saturday | Ramzan 17, 1426 |
500 families take shelter in Abbottabad
ABBOTTABAD, Oct 21: Local people and some NGOs are taking care of some 500 families who have migrated from Azad Kashmir, Balakot and Hazara and providing them food and other essential items. While this succour is welcome, the uprooted families anxiously wait for the early implementation of the rehabilitation programme of the government.
Although the government has provided them some goods, the migrated families look forward to early settlement as only some of them have taken shelter in a few government-owned premises while most have been living with relatives, friends and in rented houses.
This has put pressure on families hosting them, and they want to move out of these lodgings and into the government-sponsored tent villages as quickly as possible.
With no means of their own, these families need a regular supply of foodstuff without having to stretch out their hands, said one quake victim.
Abbottabad is a seasonal city where houses are let on comparatively low rent during off-season, especially from September onward, but due to a sudden rush of people coming from the quake zone, property owners have increased rents four-fold and people in need of rented premises are running from pillar to post but often without success.
Suhail Qureshi, one of the survivors belonging to Muzaffarabad, said that most of the families now taking shelter in Abbottabad used to spend a life of comfort, owning houses and running good businesses, but they have lost everything. They have left their homes with just one pair of cloth and are passing through the hardest time of their life.
They demand early removal of debris so they can move back to their homes and start their life anew with dignity and honour.
DCO Abbottabad Capt (retd) Muneer Azam told this reporter that due to late arrival of tents, the proposed tent village at Havelian could not be made functional. He, however, said that all arrangements for the purpose were nearing completion, including water supply, drainage and levelling of site.
The newly-elected district council has started compiling data about the loss of life and property in all the 51 union councils of Abbottabad district, especially in the eight badly damaged union councils. No such activity is being seen in the cantonment area, though, where in addition to the damage done to at least eight shopping plazas, 60 per cent boundary walls of houses have either collapsed or developed cracks of serious nature. At least 18 people died there.
Shifting of patients from the damaged building of Ayub Medical Complex continued on the second day on Friday, with 65 patients going to Peshawar, 158 to DHQ Hospital Abbottabad, and 35 to private hospitals.
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