Incremental plight of Gojal people
Muhammad Darjat
Mix farming is the livelihood means of most families in the disaster-affected villages. The villages are known for producing quality apricot (also exported to UK), cherry and Russian olive honey. Young villagers used to work with the Chinese contractors on a concrete bridge, which now lies submerged under water. Another 800 feet span RCC bridge sank weeks ago.
This year majority of potato growers could not plant for commercial purposes as KKH is blocked, there are no transport and agriculture inputs and the high cost of transportation.
The lake is impoverishing more households; parents would not be able to pay fee of their children, essential foods items are either missing or prices have gone up. Students from down country institutions cannot visit their parents in the villages due to budgetary problems.
The ecological impact may cause more precipitation and affect life-supporting systems with crop damage. The low temperature may affect the harvest of cereal and fruit crops reducing agriculture produce for domestic consumption. Loss of livelihoods may cause displacement of people.
These losses could have been minimized by taking timely decision to release water from the lake. Number of deadlines to release water from the lake has passed and the credibility of concerned organizations has become questionable.
Complete at DAWN
Uncle Muhammad Darjat has made an exemplary effort to highlight the problems associated with Hunza disaster. Thanks for such a self explanatory write-up.
It is obvious that the federal and provincial government has now become more active after foreseeing the damages expected due to outburst of artificial lake. As we say ‘it is useless to cry over the spilt milk’. The damage could have been minimized if timely action was taken by the concerned authorities in a proactive way. Anyway the people of Gojal are not hopeless and they would succeed in this hardnosed moment of trial.
May I request the people of Gojal to avoid unnecessary travel and manage storage of basic amenities of life for an unforeseen period. Pamir Times is doing wonderful job by updating people around the glob about ongoing state of affairs in disaster hit areas. PT has published a very well conceived public service message in Urdu. It needs to be made practical.
Regards, Shujaat Ali
My article is partially reflected in Pamir Times- shows limted relevency. Interested readers may log in to Dawn for complete reflection. Thanks Shujahat for the compliments. Thanks Noor for posting. I appriciate Farman Ali Editor Dawn News for Publishing in the news paper.
dear friends we are going to be a big destruction.and destruction of more than12000 peoples directly and25000 peoples indirectly, 31 villages,8 large bridges of area and 30 small bridges,many schools,homes,hospitals from the brust of atta abad lake. where is the role of GB govt, where stands our local media ? where we stands politically. ??? where our political leaders???