MUZAFFARABAD, Oct 8: People in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) observed on Monday silence for one minute and offered special prayers for thousands of their loved ones killed by the Oct 8, 2005 earthquake.

While conflicting claims were made by government functionaries and civil society activists regarding the process of reconstruction, in Muzaffarabad, which was hit particularly badly by the quake, an alliance of local political parties and civil society organisations held a sit-in to protest against what was termed ‘suspended reconstruction process’.

But Prime Minister Chaudhry Abdul Majeed brushed aside the allegations and said the governments in Muzaffarabad and Islamabad were determined to accomplish the task ‘on war footing’.

It was for the first time in seven years that no federal minister or official came to Muzaffarabad to attend any activity held to mark the anniversary of the devastating earthquake. The day dawned with a large number of people visiting graveyards to offer prayers for the souls departed on the fateful day in 2005 in nightmarish conditions.

At 8:52am, when the quake had struck, sirens were sounded and one-minute silence was observed. PM Majeed and members of his cabinet visited a monument to the victims in the University College Ground and laid wreaths.

A Muttahida Qaumi Movement delegation, led by its two members of the National Assembly and two AJK ministers, also visited the place and laid wreaths.

The premier attended an exhibition of photographs depicting the horror of the quake, arranged in the MLA Hostel by the Legislative Assembly’s Deputy Speaker Shaheen Kausar Dar.

Speaking at the day’s main function, Mr Majeed praised the people, government and armed forces of the country for extending support to the earthquake survivors.

“That was the most testing time of our history…. But thanks to Allah we recovered from it with the help of our Pakistani brethren, international community and the NGOs,” he remarked.

“The reconstruction process is in progress. Hundreds of projects have been completed and hundreds of others are in the process of completion,” he said. He praised the official machinery for providing liberal aid for reconstruction and rehabilitation, notwithstanding the financial crisis that had gripped the country.

Mr Majeed termed complaints about paucity of funds for the reconstruction process ‘unjustified’ and said Islamabad had helped the survivors above and beyond its resources.

However, participants and speakers at the sit-in camp set up in Upper Adda alleged that the government had shifted Rs55 billion allocated for the reconstruction to other heads “for political reasons”.

Iftikhar Gillani, a PML-N lawmaker from Muzaffarabad city, alleged that the PPP rulers and their handpicked lot in Muzaffarabad were trying to hoodwink the people. “They have shelved a majority of the projects,” he alleged and warned, “but we will snatch our rights.”

Zahid Amin, a former chairman of the Development Authority Muzaffarabad, alleged that the authorities supervising the reconstruction process did not have the money to complete even a handful of projects they had initiated, “what to speak of the rest which run into hundreds”.

Shaikh Aqeel ur Rehman of Jamaat-i-Islami said: “If the funds provided by the international community for reconstruction were not utilised for that purpose, we will be justified to raise this issue at any international forum.”