March 4, 2006	Saturday	Safar 3, 1427

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RAWALPINDI, March 3: The Civil Defence setup is meant to handle emergency situations but the one in the city has been lacking in equipment and manpower since 1965, it is learnt.

  Its workers will have to fight a disaster virtually empty- handed. What to say of essential kits, they even lack helmets, gloves, shoes, electric cutter, crane, transport and ropes.

“Our first prime minister, Liaquat Ali Khan, had given us rescue vans and other facilities which lasted till 1965 and were auctioned. Since then this most important office has been totally ignored by the government,” a source in the Civil Defence told Dawn on Friday.

Though obliged to rush immediately to the site of any emergency in the city, he said: “We have no explosive detector. The only instrument we use in risky situations is our courage.”

Interestingly, the 1984 model van the city Civil Defence squad has to rush to a disaster scene would move only when pushed.

Training volunteers in Civil Defence is also a job of the office but those interested turn their backs after seeing the pitiable conditions there, the source said.

“The government is expected to provide uniforms to the volunteers and some sort of security to their families but none is provided to them,” the source remarked.

Rawalpindi was the only city in the country that registered maximum number of volunteers and deserved such incentives, the source said.

Despite the official talk of creating cells for disaster management in the country, the source said half of the posts sanctioned for the Civil Defence office were lying vacant because the Punjab government had banned recruitment.

Posts of instructors, rescuers and first aid workers had been lying vacant for years but the government remained unconcerned, the source said.

“We have no manpower, no equipment - not even for putting out a fire. We are soldiers without weapons,” a senior Civil Defence official told this reporter seeking anonymity.

“If Civil Defence carries no importance what was the need of creating the National Volunteer Movement (NVM). We are on the top in producing volunteers but nobody appreciate us, rather we are crying for basic equipments,” the official said.