2005 Kashmir Earthquake:

Rehabilitation and reconstruction

By,
USMAN ILYAS
Assistant Professor
Civil Engineering Department
University of Management & Technology, Lahore
• Just to recount the devastation, the earthquake killed 73,338
people; more than 50% among them were children and
women. It also seriously injured 69,412 and displaced 3.5
million people. About 30,000 sq. km area was affected,
where infrastructure, communication and crop land were
severely damaged. It deprived 42,600 families from earning
members and made them dependant on the society. In
addition, 600,000 houses, 6,298 schools and 796 health
facilities were demolished. About 6,440 km roads were
damaged and 50-70% of the water supply,
sanitation, telecommunication and power infrastructure
was rendered un- operational.

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• The first priority at the time of disaster was to save
lives and secure the dignity of affected
population. On-setting of winter was
countered with appropriate arrangements to
provide winterized tents and shelters to people in
high altitude mountainous areas. After six
months, the emergency operation ended to mark
the beginning of recovery from the aftermath of the
earthquake.

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 Challenges Faced (1)
The only existing organizations at the time were
Federal Emergency Relief Cell of Cabinet Division,
ProvincialEmergency Relief Cells at provincial levels
and Civil Defense Organizations at district level.
However, their resources and infrastructure was too
inadequate to meet the challenge. That necessitated
establishment of a functional disaster management
organization to assume responsibility for the delivery of
rescue and relief immediately;

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• The area affected by the earthquake was vast
with dispersed inhabitations and difficult
mountainous terrain made logistics an absolute
nightmare.
• The initial damage assessment was not accurate
and therefore the relief work continued to
expand as new information came in from
inaccessible areas

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 Challenges Faced (3)
• The available human resources were inadequate.
Most of the relief workers and volunteers did not
have the type of skills and experience required for
delivery of relief operation
• All major roads were blocked and there was
traffic congestion restricting smooth flow of relief
goods and material;

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 Challenges Faced (4)
• Pakistan had not faced such a calamity before and therefore
did not have the experience of handling a large air traffic and
relief goods that started to come in. As Chaklala Airbase got
utilized to its capacity, Peshawar and Lahore bases were
opened to handle the incoming traffic;
• Due to enormous loss of lives and damage to
government buildings, the civil administration became
dysfunctional.
• Initially, there was a lack of inter agency coordination
until the Government decided to create the Federal
Relief Commission and made it responsible for coordination of
the relief efforts and interact with all the national and
international partners.
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 Challenges Faced (5)
• Relied personnel and general public had no
experience or expertise to handle the injured,
especially with back-bone injuries and
handicapped in such a large number;
• Domestic experience to address the problems of
Internally Displace People (IDPs) on international
standards and provide protection to the most
vulnerable.

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The Earthquake Reconstruction and Rehabilitation
Authority, in close consultation with donors and
sponsors and in collaboration with Provincial
Earthquake Reconstruction and Rehabilitation
Authority (PERRA), State Earthquake Reconstruction
and Rehabilitation Authority (SERRA) and line
departments developed a comprehensive umbrella
programme covering 12 major sectors as follows.

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1 Housing
2. Livelihoods
3. Education
4. Health
5. Water and Sanitation
6. Governance
7. Power
8. Transportation
9. Communication
10. Social Protection
11. Environment
12. Tourism and Industry
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Providing an enabling environment to builders and
homeowners, through:
• prior training, information, education and
communication campaigns;
• rebuilding with familiar methods and easily
accessible materials

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 Housing (2)
• Providing technical assistance during construction;
• Promoting the use of own labor, salvaged material,
and additional resources such as locally available
skilled labor, etc.;
• Facilitating the opening of bank accounts.
• Ensuring a stable and efficient supply chain of
building materials

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 Housing (3)
• Payments were made in trenches, these were
linked with stages of construction.
• Preliminary needs assessment estimate
approximately 324,000 people lost their jobs or
primary means of income as a result of the
earthquake. This number represents 29 percent of
the employed population of the affected districts.
• The Cash Grants Programme is being
implemented in order to assist the most
vulnerable groups in the affected population.

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• Schools were built on new standard and with
better capacity as children are more vulnerable
than adult in any disastrous situation thus, their
safety is priority.

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• Public buildings and machinery were heavily
damaged with earthquake. Thus, it was also
important sector to rehabilitate civil administration
and enhance their capacity.
• Office buildings were constructed and residents,
besides fabricated offices were provided to quick
recovery.

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• Woman and children are most vulnerable groups
and these groups were addressed.
• In housing construction NGOs were involved for
constructing houses to widows and people those
become disabled.
• Legal support provided to the widows and children
those who feared to loose their property rights.

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• In order to achieve better planning,
implementation and sustained coordination,
linkages with the district, provincial and state
governments have to be strengthened.
• Due to lack of capacity of the district, provincial
and state governments, target based delivery of
the Early Recovery Planning should be done;
• The relief organizations should not be encouraged
to get involved in the reconstruction activities
because different set of expertise required in the
two situations.

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• There needs to be a reasonable timeframe for
discontinuation of relief activities.
• People should be given reasonable incentives and
assistance for early return to normal life cycle,
such as cash, in affected areas through housing
and livelihood grants.

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THANKS