P E R S P E C T I V E

lest we FORGET
After floods, Valley’s winter challenge
Jhelum tested Kashmir’s resolve in September, and now it’s the time of the unsparing cold weather. Even as all eyes are fixed on Assembly elections, a long and harsh winter confronts the inadequately prepared Valley as it tries to pick up pieces from the loss and destruction in the floods.
By Azhar Qadri
It takes some courage to look at Jawahar Nagar and once you do, difficult to take your eyes off. This is what destruction means, this is what it looks like.

Two and a half months is a long time, but parts of Jawahar Nagar in Srinagar still show signs of damage and loss caused by the ravaging Jhelum. Tribune photos: Yawar Kabli

lest we FORGET
After floods, Valley’s winter challenge
Jhelum tested Kashmir’s resolve in September, and now it’s the time of the unsparing cold weather. Even as all eyes are fixed on Assembly elections, a long and harsh winter confronts the inadequately prepared Valley as it tries to pick up pieces from the loss and destruction in the floods.
By Azhar Qadri

It takes some courage to look at Jawahar Nagar and once you do, difficult to take your eyes off. This is what destruction means, this is what it looks like.

Located in the heart of Srinagar, the bustling residential area bore the brunt when the Jhelum river unleashed its fury on September 7 and ravaged through the western and southern parts of the city. The barely standing abandoned structures, home to thousands just over two months ago, won’t let Kashmir valley forget what it went through. Neither will the unsparing winter what it will have to go through.

People didn’t lose just their houses — 83,044 concrete structures got fully damaged and 96,089 partially throughout the state, besides the 21,000-plus temporary shelters that gave way, as per the initial assessment of the state government — but everything they possessed. The case of Mohammad Rafiq Mattoo, the Chief Animal Husbandry Officer of Srinagar, provides a glimpse of the winter challenge the Valley faces.

A widow, Gulshan, lost her son in the floods, and their house. The winter is another test in the long ordeal that awaits her.

His house in Jawahar Nagar collapsed in the floods. “You won’t believe it, I don’t even have clothes to wear. It is winter and I don’t have a jacket. I am a district-level officer and this is my condition now,” Mattoo says. “Everything we had, clothes, essential commodities, quilts and mattresses, is gone. The government has no realisation. And just imagine the plight of others,” he adds. A few houses in Jawahar Nagar are being rebuilt and repaired as the cold takes a firm grip, but most of the residents have shifted to other places – living with relatives or on rent.

In adjoining Raj Bagh, Wazir Bagh and Gogji Bagh, the water rose to unprecedented levels of 20 to 25 feet. The residents of these localities, like many in other parts of Srinagar city, got no time to secure lifetime savings. When the water receded after more than a month, it had taken away everything. The state government’s interim compensation for a fully collapsed house is a paltry Rs 75,000 and Mattoo, for one, spent it to clear the rubble in his house. The interim relief package is less than 10 per cent of the state Cabinet’s approved proposal, which was submitted to the Central government for funding, to pay Rs 9 lakh for a fully damaged house.

In Mandar Bagh, a few kilometres from Jawahar Nagar, the deluge was sudden when an embankment of a channel collapsed. “Within minutes, the water filled the first storey of every structure and no one could salvage anything,” recalls Rouf Ahmad, who volunteered for relief work and hasn’t stopped doing it.

Close to where Rouf lived stood 50-year-old Gulshan’s three-room house which she shared with her two children. Nothing is left of it now, nothing to talk about, that is. The floor has layers of dust, the windows are broken and the walls have crumbled. The widow is not only torn by the loss of her home, but also by the death of her son Mohammad Musaib, who drowned when a boat capsized in their neighbour’s compound. “I had left the house in the morning from the second floor window. It was the second day of floods. He drowned in the afternoon,” she says, unsure of what her son was doing when he died. “I don’t know whether he was rescuing others or was trying to leave,” Gulshan sobs.

She was paid Rs 1.5 lakh as compensation for her son’s death. With no regular income, it is going to be a long haul to rebuild her life and house, the winter the immediate hurdle to cross.

The deluge’s aftermath led to several groups of volunteers coming to the rescue as the government machinery was initially nowhere to be seen and later reacted slowly to the disaster of an unprecedented scale. Junaid Nabi, an engineer and a volunteer relief worker, terms the situation grim. “This winter is certainly going to be harsh and difficult,” he says. Junaid and a group of volunteers have so far distributed 350 kangris — traditional earthen fire pots used for decades in Kashmir as a warming device in winter — and 2,000 blankets among the flood-hit families in the city. Acknowledging the immense need for winter wear, they are now preparing for the distribution of 180 pherans or long woollen cloaks.

“There are so many people,” Nabi says, “who were in a bad condition before the floods and are now in a worse situation. Some have lost their houses, some have no warm clothes, no blankets, even no money to buy coal. This winter is going to be another test after the floods.”

The mercury tends to plunge several notches below freezing point in the Valley, at times turning Dal Lake into ice. The winter brings snow to all parts of Kashmir and recent years have seen severe snow storms. Winter here is traditionally split into three phases. The harshest, known as Chillai Kalaan in local parlance, begins on December 21 and lasts for 40 days till January 31. As the white blanket engulfs Kashmir in the coming days, it would do more than prayers to keep warm.

 

COLD AND DUST The Srinagar MC has removed 68,000 tonnes of waste and rubble, forcing residents to wear masks in several areas. The ravaging Jhelum left a trail of destruction in September, killing 85 people in Kashmir valley. From September 11 to November 9, the Srinagar Municipal Corporation removed a massive 68,000 tonnes of waste and rubble from the flood-ravaged city and the clean-up operations are still continuing. Dust and stink have become permanent features in some areas, even forcing residents to wear masks. The state government has sought a special financial package of Rs 44,000 crore from the Central government for rehabilitation of flood-affected people and restoration of damaged infrastructure. Divisional Commissioner, Kashmir, Rohit Kansal says an interim compensation of Rs 75,000 has been sanctioned for 7,960 fully damaged houses. “Relief and rehabilitation are underway at a very rapid pace. Over Rs 125 crore has been sanctioned so far as interim relief,” he adds. Kansal says the state government has also sanctioned a plan for reimbursement of rental compensation, which includes Rs 5,000 per month for urban areas, Rs 3,500 for semi-urban and Rs 2,000 for rural areas for a period of four months. “We are trying our best so that people are not put to any inconvenience.” Relief work continues in Jammu region Heavy rain followed by flash floods claimed 218 lives in Jammu region in September. More than 96,000 structures were damaged in all 10 districts of the region and the relief work is still going on in most of the places. The state government has so far provided ex gratia relief of Rs 4.5 crore to families of 192 people who died in the natural calamity, while 55,496 families have been paid Rs 31 crore ex gratia on account of the structures damaged. Jammu district was the worst affected, with damage to about 29,000 structures, while in terms of casualties, Rajouri saw 92 people lose their lives, followed by Udhampur with a toll of 62. An ex gratia of Rs 1.5 lakh has been paid to each family which lost a member. Immediately after floods, the government distributed 4,633 tents and so far over 40,000 blankets have been given. It set up 266 relief camps across Jammu region and one camp was also set up by a voluntary organisation.

Looking ahead, with expectations

The September floods impacted every aspect of Kashmir’s life. Lal Chowk, the commercial nerve centre of Srinagar, was turned into a dusty mess and is now slowly limping back to its old self.

Shakeel Qalandar, a member of the Kashmir Centre for Social and Development Studies and a former member of the Prime Minister’s Reconstruction Programme for Jammu and Kashmir, feels it will take a minimum of six months to revive Lal Chowk if all facilities are provided.

The tourism industry, meanwhile, has almost been ruined. Mushtaq Chaya, the chairman of JK Hoteliers Club, says the hotel industry has been stalled since the floods. “Because of the message that went out, everybody thinks that the entire Kashmir is paralysed,” Chaya, who is also the chairman of Mushtaq Group of Hotels, adds.

He points out how the key tourist destinations like Gulmarg, Sonmarg and Pahalgam are more than ready to host visitors. “I think people in lakhs who are directly and indirectly related to tourism have been impacted, be it a ponnywalla or a shawl seller or taxi drivers. It is important that this message goes out that Kashmir is okay now,” he says.

The Director of the Centre for Research and Development Policy, Suhail Masoodi, feels there is an urgent need to continue efforts of rehabilitation of the flood-hit population. “The challenge now is to create livelihood for the people, to create employment. The government should build houses instead of prefab structures. This will generate employment as all material will come locally and it will renew the cycle of economy,” he says. Masoodi’s policy group recently organised a seminar on “Kashmir Floods: Genesis, Responses and Way Forward” to critically assess the causes of floods, the implications and the response to the disaster. “There needs to be a coordinated effort between the government and non-governmental organisations to avoid duplication of effort,” he says.

What’s more disturbing is that the deluge has scarred the psyche of a large number of people, pushing many to the borderline of post-traumatic stress disorder, insomnia and anxiety.

“A positive environment will help the people to recover and negative environment will worsen the conditions. We have to be very vigilant,” Mushtaq Margoob, a leading psychiatrist of the region, says.