| Agony of man, who lost 11 relatives in landslide | | 'My house has turned into a graveyard' | |  Early Times Report
Srinagar, Apr 2: "I started rushing towards my home at 5 in the morning. I reached at about 9am. There was no home. My house had turned into a graveyard of my whole family," Shabir says as his voice chokes. The way to Laden, located at Karewas, is treacherous. The road has been washed away in many places and one has to trek some distance to reach the village.
Villagers have moved Shabir into the house of a neighbour at Kralgam village, where they are trying to console the young man. Shabir, who was returning home after two months, runs a barber’s shop at Nowgam on the outskirts of Srinagar.
His elder brothers Riyaz and Bilal were running barber's shops in the Pampore area of South Kashmir. Both made it to their home on Sunday only to get buried under mounds of earth. Their father Ghulam Nabi Hajam was a farmer, and mother Zena Begam a housewife. They had 11 children, six daughters and five sons.
The family had fixed the marriage of elder son Riyaz and two daughters Naseema Akhtar and Shahida Akhtar. And the household was in a happy state when tragedy struck. Their two-storey house, among the four in Laden village, was considered a strong one.
The family’s neighbour Muhammad Shaban and his wife Ruksana were sure about the safety of Hajam's house and had moved into their home with their two daughters and 22-day-old baby after they heard creaking sounds in their own residence. They were also buried with Shabir's family.
Shabir's uncle Ghulam Muhammad said: "The house was situated on a slope and I asked my brother to move to our house at Kralgam. But he refused and we didn't feel there was any danger. I had tea there and later I went home." At 3am on Sunday, Muhammad said he heard cries and rushed towards Laden. He was dumbfounded to see his brother's house under a huge mound of earth.
"We couldn't do anything," he said. "We recovered six bodies on our own by 11am," Muhammad said, adding that later the local authorities brought JCB machines and pulled out the remaining nine bodies. "The 22-day-old baby, who was not even named, was found in the lap of his mother Ruksana. When the house was buried in mud, they probably didn't even realise. They were all found asleep in their beds," he said. The local imam named the 22-day-old baby Muhammad Aslam and now everyone refers to his grave as Aslam's grave.
Shabir, meanwhile, sits in his neighbour's house, waiting for news about his six-year-old brother Faisal Ahmad. He asks whether they have found Faisal's body, but no one answers. There is only silence. |
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