After securing most of the holed up elders to safer places, a group of youngsters, marooned in this devastated south Kashmir village, was sure of their impending death. The rampaging Vaishu river originating from Kausarnag in south Kashmir hills had breached into the forlorn village and cut through four channels to wash away everything from concrete houses to mammoth trees.
Amid the thunderous water-flow, the village boys took a decision to die in a religious and obedient way. After calling up their family members for forgiveness, they assembled and held a funeral prayer.
“It was a unique prayer. We had no coffin in front of us but we thought everyone of us is in a coffin. We wept and imagined our bodies getting washed away”, said Masood Ahmad Dar, a jobless MBA, who miraculously survived the devastating flood. The group of youngsters walked to safety after the water levels receded in the village after a week’s time.
The Gund village near Kelam has literally gone into Stone Age. A macadamised road that was an exhibition of development and promise to progress is completely destroyed. The road is now a long stretch of boulders. Some damaged shops and houses in a line give an inkling that they must have been standing alongside the road. The road was supposed to link the village with Mughal Road that connects Kashmir valley with Rajouri in Jammu province.
“There was my concrete house”, a villager Ali Muhammad points towards an expanse of rocks. It seems unbelievable. There is no trace of the house. “The furious nullah brought down the house brick by brick”, he said with tears in his eyes. Muhammad’s family is living in a makeshift tent, provided by the Army, two kilometers away from the ill-fated village. In all 42 houses were washed away and rest of the 182 houses are unsafe to live. Each passing day the standing houses are developing cracks.
Village elder Abdur Rahman Shera, 65, said that the river breached at Brazloo and fragmented into four roaring streams. “I have never seen such devastation. The flood was never coming our way. This time, it caught us unawares”, he said.
Schoolteacher Shabir Ahmad Shera said that the incessant rains started September 1 and by the fourth day local army unit alerted the villagers of the impending breach in the banks of Vaishu. “We have lost our cattle and properties. Our apple orchards and paddy fields are devastated”, he said. Shera’s school is nowhere visible. He pointed towards a grilled window and an abandoned lock. “These are the reminiscences of the school where I was teaching”, he said. Shera picked up the lock and threw it back into the sea of boulders.
Shera complimented the efforts of the Army and the volunteers of neighboring Ashmuji and Kelam villages for rescuing them. “The local administration was nowhere visible when we required them the most”, he said.
“We saw the people from the administration after three weeks today. They gave us 50 kilograms of rice. Those who lost their houses were given a cheque of Rs75,000 each”, Rahman said.
The situation is no less devastating in nearby Chambgund, Achtal and Adigatnu villages, situated on the Vaishu’s right bank in a stretch of eight kilometers. At Chambgund, the story of Bhat family is heart wrenching. Ahmad Bhat and his wife have died almost a decade ago leaving behind eight children, aged between 2 and 25 years. They were now living in two separate hutments built under Indira Awas Yojna scheme.