Suleman Shahid (Netherlands): We raised 1300 euros for a food truck (10 kg Flour and 10 kg Rice for more than 200 families) and food items were Alhumdulillah successfully delivered by Hammad Cheema (Islamabad) and his team in really unaccessible areas (Chakdara, Thana, sawat, ...) . Mashallah wonderful effort by him.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/pakistan/2010/08/100817_chakdara_bridge_pics.shtml
Hammad Cheema (Islamabad): Summary of the activity
Donations:
1300 Euros(~1,40000 RPS) - Suleman Shahid (Holland)
70500 RPS(22000, 34000, 14500 - (Pakistani donors)
Total Cash at hand: 2,10500 RPS
Costs:
300 bags Rice: 1,21,500 RPS
300 bags Flour: 82,500 RPS
Transport : 15,000 RPS
Total Costs: 2,19,000 RPS
Here is the story:
"Its the worst flood of our history", we have heard this from many but one has to see it to feel the real magnitude of the calamity facing our beloved
country. I started to contact friends in Khyber Pukhtoonkha (KP) to find out which areas were less focused on by NGOs and the government and surprisingly
Malakand division was the one being ignored. This division includes the famous tourist spots of Swat, Mingora, Madyan, Bahrain and Kalam.
The next step was fund raising for which friends from Holland responded quickly and sent around 1 lac 40 thousand RPS. A truck carrying 300 bags of rice and
300 bags of flour was arranged with Mingora as target destination. The rest of the money was raised within Pakistan from friends and family. The truck was loaded
in Gujranwala where the price and quality of rice and flour is reasonable.
I left from Rawalpindi at 5am after sehri on 15th August. Taking the Islamabad-Peshawar motorway M-1, i reached Mardan where i was joined by my liason Saad Abdullah who happens to be information secretary of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Khyber Pukhtoonkhwa. From Mardan we passed through Durgai, Takht Bhai and the famous Butkhela Bazar.
All along the way, River Swat was on our left side which now had receded but the devastation it had caused could be seen by the remnants of river-side hotels, homes,bridges and the like. There are around 95 bridges in the region on Swat river and none of them survived the flood. Resultantly, 15-18 lac population on the other side of the river are disconnected from main land. These include Dir, Tehsil Shamozai (famous for Swat emaralds), Kabbal and Matta. There is no way of delivering aid with cars, the only possible way is by foot where one has to walk hours to reach thewashed away villages or by boats to cross the river.
We spend some time at the Chakdara bridge which was the main artery between Malakand and Dir, Shamozai etc. About 40% of this bridge had collapsed and the twisted concrete was lying about 500 meters away from the actual location of the bridge. The Sheer force of flood water is unimaginable. A few kilometers away from Chakdara is a small locality of Thana where we met our first distributing person Dr. Amjad.
Dr. Amjad is from Shamozai and came walking from his village to meet us. He briefed us about the situation on the other side of the river and mentioned the dire
circumstances and the lack of focus on the disconnected villages. We handed him 200 bags of rice and 200 bags of flour which were to be distributed in Shamozai. He had asked army to let him use the rubber boats to cross the cruel waves of Swat river.
Our final destination was the main city of Swat called Mingora. This was about 1 hour further from our first distribution point. The main bridge of Mingora which led
Bahrain, Madyan and Kalam was broken and the tourists in these cities have been stranded for days. The locals explained how the high rise water entered their homes around 4 am without any warning. They told something which was new for me, that the sudden rise of water was due to water falling at once from the skies similar to how lightening strikes. Digging further into details, i came to know that this phenonmenon is called cloud burst where the rainfall is so heavy that it seems a bucket of thousands of gallon of water is turned upside down. On the fateful day 5 cloud bursts happened in Swat alone. the link bridges in the localities were earthed, water along with mud entered people houses with levels upto 8 feet high. The unfortunate families had to pay a hefty amount (80,000 RPS) to get their houses cleaned.
The remaining bags of rice and flour were handed to a responsible person in Mingora for onward distribution. The people of Mingora were quite angry at no substantial relief reaching them from NGOs or govt agencies.
Devastation stories are uncountable. 8 brothers had their houses on the bank of river Swat and now only a few walls remain. The land, the houses, furniture
all were washed away. The damage assesement of Kalam and other tourists cities have not been done, but people say that almost all hotels alongside River Swat have disappeared in water. I saw a mobile video of the fateful day when a 3 story hotel just fell in water like a building is earthed by a controlled demolition. People
witnessed trucks, cars, refrigrators, freezers and what not floating in the river like toys.
We left Mingora at 3 pm on our return journey after an eye opening voyage. The seriousness of the calamity has become clear and it is difficult to say
how long it will take to return to normal conditions in Malakand region. May Allah have mercy on us and forgive us as these disasters are a reminder
that man despite of the advancements is still at mercy of nature.