Tangdhar’s night without end: 300 already dead, many still missing

Several villages have been completely cut off after Saturday’s earthquake. Teams from the civil administration and the Army have not been able to reach Semari, Kalhama, Mushran, Relian, Beri and Tad. Officials fear the toll would shoot up when the real damage in these areas are assessed.

The only sign of relief in Tangdhar is the Army. The troops have been fighting a difficult battle against time and their choppers are constantly ferrying injured villagers and their own men to 15 Corps’ base hospital in Srinagar.

Among those brought to Srinagar is a six-year-old boy, who was wounded seriously in his chest and stomach. He was bleeding and unconscious when an old man, carrying him from Tahri village, put him inside an Army chopper. No one knows his story, not even the old man who rescued him.

And he didn’t carry any identification and Army doctors anxiously waited till this morning to operate upon him. They needed a consent from his family. Messages were flashed to Tangdhar but there was no news. Finally, Commandant of 92 Base hospital, Brigadier K K Duttagupta decided to take the risk.

‘‘I couldn’t see this beautiful boy dying,’’ Duttagupta said. ‘‘So I decided to go ahead and operate. We had to literally open the front portion of the body. Thank God, he is safe now.’’

Duttagupta said that more than 150 civilians and 80 soldiers were treated in the hospital. ‘‘We have moved 23 villagers to the government hospital after initial treatment.’’

Muqadas Geelani, a mother of two children, was pulled out of the rubble a few hours ago from her village Chamkote along the Line of Control in Tangdhar. Geelani was lucky that her children escaped unhurt as she pushed them out of the collapsing house.

She said she knew that her 30-year-old cousin, Nafeesa had died but there was no news about other members of the family.

‘‘I was sitting inside a room, when we heard a sound of stones crumbling and then the earth started moving beneath my feet. I pushed my children out of the door and asked them to run but then the wall collapsed,’’ said Geelani. ‘‘I was trapped in the rubble and both my legs has fractures.’’

Geelani, the first villager to be moved out, said she knew 15 who died. ‘‘I don’t know how many more have been buried alive. All the houses in my village are now a pile of rubble,’’ she says.

Zanab Bano was pulled out of the rubble by her children when her house collapsed in Tanghdar and then taken on their shoulders to the Army camp.

She was later airlifted to Srinagar. ‘‘Only two houses in my village have survived,’’ she says. ‘‘It’s miracle that I am alive.’’

Armymen’s family quarters, too, came crumbling down in Tangdhar. ‘‘I tried to jump out of the quarter. But the wall came down on me,’’ said jawan Sunil Kumar’s wife. She did not want to disclose her name. ‘‘My father is a heart patient and he will die if he gets to know.’’

‘‘All the barracks and quarters have been razed. I was lucky. I had a narrow escape,’’ said S G Gakewad, a soldier who had a close shave when their bunker crumbled at Juma Gund, Karah.

‘‘Within minutes everything ended. I saw three of my colleagues die.’’ Gaekwad was rescued by BSF men from under the rubble three hours later.