Pakistan to relocate 55,000 Quake Survivors
'Pakistan Times' Special correspondent

MUZAFFARABAD (AJK): Almost 55,000 earthquake survivors will be relocated due to the danger posed by monsoon landslides in Azad Kashmir, officials said on Saturday.

“A strategy is being evolved to relocate some 50 to 55 thousand people from areas prone to landslides before the start of monsoon season,” the region’s top administrator Kashif Murtaza said.

Murtaza said that 18 villages were likely to be affected.

The government would work with the United Nations and other aid agencies get the people out of harm’s way, he said.

“It is a big challenge to relocate the most vulnerable to safer places before the monsoon starts,” Murtaza said.

Depending on how many people need to be resettled the government may have to buy land near Muzaffarabad, the capital of Azad Kashmir, he added.

The government already pays 25,000 jobless survivors a monthly benefit of 3,000 rupees (50 dollars) under a six-month grant programme.

It has also paid 4.27 billion rupees (71 million dollars) to 58,000 survivors whose houses were damaged by the earthquake.

The 7.6 magnitude quake on October 8, 2005 claimed more than 77,000 lives, seriously injured nearly 70,000 people and left 3.3 million homeless in Pakistan and Azad Kashmir.

Landslide in Monsoon

Chief Secretary of Azad Kashmir Murtaza has warned of massive landslides threatening to 50,000-55,000 of lives of quake victims in the area in the upcoming monsoon seasons.

“Around 50,000-55,000 people are living in such areas were heavy landsliding can take place as the monsoon season begins.

However, as the monsoon seasons is getting closers settling the threatened people in the area at a safe places is a serious challenge for the government”, he stated.

The Government of Azad Kahmir is working hand in hand with the Unitd Nations and other aid agencies to offset such possible situation before it erupts into a volcanoci problem, informed the chief secrtary.

He said, efforts had also been taken in shape of considering over purchasing land at a place near Muzzaffarabad to shift the people who are in apparent threat of the landslides.●