MulWarwan fire-affected victims; Narrated the tale with a heavy heart after becoming homeless within hours.

GNS ONLINE NEWS PORTAL

SHAFQAT SHEIKH

CHENAB VALLEY OOCTOBER 21-2024

Everyone is aware of the sudden MulWarwan fire that happened in Tehsil Warwan a week ago, resulting in the loss of property and leaving more than 80 families homeless. Such fire incidents are not new for such remote areas; they happen every year or within two years, resulting in the loss of properties and belongings of these families.

Within a few hours, the whole of MulWarwan village turned into ashes due to a lack of precautionary measures and firefighting tools and equipment that could have led to controlling the blaze.

As soon as the report of fire incidents broke out, the administration deployed the men and machinery, including Fire and Emergency Services, toward MulWarwan to control the fire. Before it could reach, it was too late due to the worst single-lane road, more than 70 km from Larnoo Anantnag.

The MulWarwan village has more than 200 houses, among which more than 80 houses are completely damaged, and nothing could be saved due to a lack of fire-controlling tools and other equipment.

The incidents became an examination for the government in rebuilding the lost structures of residents for which the government is taking the matter on a priority basis and stands with the victims which proved that day after taking oath as Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir Union Territory Shir Omar Abdullah visited MulWarwan and expressed sympathy with the victims families assuring that everything will be rebuilt and returned to the affected families. The Chief Minister was accompanied by the Deputy Chief Minister, Shri Surinder Choudhary, and other politicians, including Member of Legislative Assembly Inderwal Shri Payare Lal Sharma and other District and Sectoral Officers.

At the instant reports of fire incidents, Deputy Commissioner Kishtwar  Rajesh Kumar Shavan JKAS, along with Senior Superintendent of Police Kishtwar Abdul Qayoom JKPS, visited MulWarwan village to express their sympathy and distributed first aid relief material among victims and monitor the situation on the ground for days together.

The incidents were horrifying where every individual and citizen expressed their concern and stood with the victims of MulWarwan. There was a mass movement started by various non-governmental organizations, Trusts, and civil societies for the collection of relief materials for the affected families, including Blankets, Utensils, and other items for daily use. There was also a collection of Cash through online and offline modes by various organizations and civil society members and volunteers for the rebuilding of MulWarwan.

Among all NGOs, Trusts, and civil society members and volunteers, A philanthropic organization, ABABEEL, collected more than 1.25 crores of cash and other relief materials for MulWarwan-affected families to build houses for the victims.

The administration also announced the compensation under various schemes and grants, including PMAY, RedCross, Chief Minister relief funds, and assuring for Prime Minister relief funds amounting to about 2 lakh per household of the affected families, wherein 48 lakhs were announced by the MLA Inderwal from his CDF, which overall reached upto 2.50 lakhs among per household.

As an average donation and collection for affected families, it is believed that a family will get about 4 lakhs of overall contribution for rebuilding their structures and houses.

The loss that happened due to the blaze can’t be returned and compensated but only could be regained by proper utilization of the whole amount collected through various organizations and announced by the government.

The District Administration Kishtwar must constitute a committee for the distribution of relief material headed by a Worthy district-level officer who personally could monitor the whole distribution process among the victims so that the affected families can get what they have lost. Otherwise, there are various such reports of mismanagement in the distribution process, which is done by the administration.

The rebuilding of structures can be done by the administration or any other civil society or organization so the structures can be rebuilt in a bound manner before it is too late as the area is snowbound with harsh winter and resulting cutoff from road connectivity for six months.

As such, I, along with volunteers, visited MulWarwan and accessed the results of the fire incident, where I interacted with various affected families who narrated a heart-wrenching story of the fire incident and distributed relief materials among these victims, urging the administration to provide relief to affected families priority basis rather than to provide the whole residents.

A resident of MulWarwan and fire-affected victim, Muhammad Ramzan, 65, witnessed the heartbreaking destruction of his daughters’ wedding preparations as a devastating fire consumed their home along with the whole belongings and wedding materials. The blaze destroyed everything Ramzan had carefully prepared for the weddings of his two daughters, Gulshan and Rubina, who were set to marry on October 22.

I also met with some other fire victims who told me that we don’t imagine that we lose as we only know that our precious earnings turn into ash and representatives are doing politics on this.

One of the poorest mothers among the victims said that we lost everything thing and our hard-earned house in which we were residing happily and earning to starve the hunger of the family, To whom I shall blame, what had happened with me and others are joking on me as no one representative is ascertaining the loss of my property.

During the interaction, the victim narrates, “One who comes across poverty knows what poverty is, and one who only sees the poor before the poor”. A sister narrates that we were already poor and now have become the poorest ones as we had lost everything and no one cared about us, and we did not even have food to eat for days together after the horrifying blaze, leaving us homeless.

It is alleged that representatives and politicians visited there and assured them of all possible help but unfortunately, no one paid a single penny to fire victims as only the Administration had provided tents and some funds as per norms whereas Non-Government Organizations, Educational Trusts, and Civil Societies are voluntary collecting donations for fire victims from every section of the society to reach out the cause of poor sufferers due to sudden fire incident.

(The author is Freelance Writer and Socio-Political Activist from Bunjwah Kishtwar and can be reached at freelancershafqat@gmail.com, 9419974577).