In the Bandi Mir Samdani neighbourhood of Muzaffarabad, which skirts the Neelum Valley road and marks the end of the town’s municipal limits, it is hard to stop staring at the mountain in the backdrop.

The mountain appears to have been shorn off; its inner light-grey core is visible. It is hard to imagine the force that caused this.

Asad Kiyani lives in Kiyani Mohalla of Bandi Mir Samdani, across this mountain, which acquired its current shape due to the devastating earthquake ten years ago, measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale.

“Whenever I look at the mountain, I am reminded of that harrowing day,” he says, remembering October 8, 2005 when much of northern Pakistan experienced an earthquake that turned towns and villages in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and neighbouring Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) into graveyards. Thousands were buried under the rubble.

‘I still remember the children and their teacher screaming for help but we could not remove those concrete slabs’

It struck around 8:52 am, hitting the northern districts of AJK and the adjoining areas of KP. In AJK, Muzaffarabad was the hardest hit, mainly because the epicentre of earthquake was just 19 kilometres (12 miles) to its northeast.

“The destruction caused - we had not imagined it in our wildest dreams,” Kiyani adds.

Experts say AJK lies on land beneath which the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates collide. The geological activity born out of this collision is the reason for the unstable seismic activity in the region.

October 8 too was a result of this activity. More than 70 per cent of all casualties were estimated to have occurred in Muzaffarabad, while Bagh, the second-most-affected district, accounted for 15 per cent of the total casualties.

Asad Kiyani, then 27 years old, was sleeping after having sehri inside his home in Kiyani Mohalla. But for some reason – he cannot remember it ten years later – he came out after eight in the morning and slept on a charpoy in his lawn.

“I was dozing when suddenly the earth beneath my charpoy started shaking; there was an ear-splitting sound, amid unrelenting jolts, and I was eventually tossed on to the floor, while the house caved in,” he says.

“When I managed to rise to my feet, everything was engulfed by clouds of dust, emanating from the mountain across the river as (a huge portion of) it had also caved in,” he adds.

According to Kiyani and many others interviewed in that neighbourhood, the clouds of dirt completely marred visibility and people were unable to see anything in front of them, let alone at a distance, for quite some time.

When the dust settled, the survivors rushed to look for their dear ones buried beneath the fallen buildings.

All the 26 houses in Kiyani Mohalla were reduced to rubble, leaving almost all the residents either dead or wounded.

Asad Kiyani’s infant nephew was killed while the adults inside the house were injured.

But next-doors, the fatalities were much higher, particularly in a government and a private educational institution, located around 100 and 200 metres away from Kiyani Mohalla, respectively.

Saghir Kiyani, now 46, was in Mirpur that morning, visiting his father.

He had taken his spouse and an infant daughter with him, but his school-going daughter and son, aged 11 and 9 years, were in Muzaffarabad, in a private school called Islamic Public School.

“When we learnt that Muzaffarabad had been hit by a devastating earthquake, we desperately tried to call home. Finally, through an acquaintance in the police (who got information on the wireless) we found out that our entire mohalla had been razed to the ground,” he recalls.

“We reached Muzaffarabad early next morning.”

They saw only death and destruction everywhere.

“Most of the children, including mine, were trapped under the rubble. Everyone was frantically trying to rescue them but we didn’t have the tools.”

The helplessness that gripped those whose relatives were trapped under the rubble has left wounds, which refuse to heal.

“I still remember the children and their teacher screaming for help but we could not remove those concrete slabs. They died as we watched,” he recalls.

By the evening of October 9, Saghir and others had retrieved as many as 80 bodies, including those of his two children and five nephews.

“We ran out of shrouds and burial space – we used the planks of school desks to cover the bodies,” says Saghir as his voice chokes.

His wife, Musarrat, breaks down.

“I shouted the names of my children, but there were no reply. I heard other children whimper; mine must have also moaned like that,” recalls the 38-year-old, as she weeps.

Ten years later, she suffers from anxiety, insomnia and hypertension.

Survivors have not been able to get over the tragedy either. Saghir says that in the past two years, his two brothers-in-law got married but there were no traditional ceremonies or celebrations.

Dr Khawaja Hamid Rashid, consultant psychiatrist at the Abbas Institute of Medical Sciences Muzaffarabad, says that the devastating earthquake left multiple psycho-social effects on the survivors.

“A large number of survivors are still suffering from post traumatic stress disorder complicated by other psychiatric and psychosocial symptoms,” he says.

“While it was hard for families to come to terms with the death of loved ones, others had difficulties coping with injuries or loss of employment opportunities,” adds the doctor.

Mir Mohammad Rizwan is the owner of Rizwan Public School in the main city, located partially on a slope that goes down to the left bank of River Neelum.

When the quake struck, part of his school’s building collapsed instantly, trapping around 350 students and 22 teachers and other staff members, including his spouse Fauzia.

“A small slab fell on her, killing her instantly. Among the other 51 dead were three teachers, a driver, and 47 students, including one of my four sons.”

Rizwan says the community still has not learnt from the earthquake.

“We should have prepared ourselves to meet any such eventuality in the future, but alas,” he laments.

Nafeesa Munir, then-20 years old, was teaching in a private school in Jalalabad, an upscale area of Muzaffarabad, which houses the official residences of the president and the prime minister.

In her family, there were eight deaths.

Ten years on, “Whenever I recall those moments, I feel as if everything just happened yesterday,” she says.

“Sleep continues to elude me and I feel an anxiousness that words cannot explain. Allah aisa waqt dushman ko na dikhaye.”

Khadijah Umer Khayam, a practicing clinical psychologist from Bagh, was a first year college student when the deadly quake hit.

After the first two jolts, the building of her college caved in, trapping her and 120 students.

She was rescued after more than two hours, with a fracture in her foot. Nonetheless, she took part in rescue efforts.

“I chose this profession because I was traumatised myself, as were members of my immediate and extended families. I wanted to learn how to bring such people back to a normal life,” she says.

Khadijah believes that negative attitudes have multiplied among the survivors.

“Natural disasters can render people numb for the rest of their lives. In some cases, victims of severe trauma experience not just fear, sadness, anger or even guilt, they even become less sensitive to the pain and agony of others,” she observes.

Back in Muzaffarabad, ageing grocer Fazal Hussain corroborates her opinion.

“On October 8, 2005 we all had a close call. And therefore empathy, brotherhood and affection should have increased,” he maintains.

“But instead people have become more greedy and self-centred.”

Published in Dawn, October 8th, 2015

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