Orphaned victims of Pak shelling may be reduced to beg for a living

Orphaned victims of Pak shelling may be reduced to beg for a living
PRADEEP DUTTA

SRINAGAR, JULY 8: "Mere Abu ko to nahi dekha? Itne din ho gaye woh kyon nahi aaye? Mujhe ghar kyon nahin le jate (Have you seen my father? Why has he not turned up even after so many days of my being injured?. And why aren't you taking me home?"

These are the questions eight-year-old Naseem keeps asking her neighbours, who are taking care of her, days after being discharged from Srinagar's Bone and Joint Hospital where she was treated for a month for her amputated right leg.

Naseem, the only surviving member of a shell-hit family of four, who has lost one leg, is just out of hospital. The girl does not know that her father also succumbed to splinter injuries from the Pakistani shell that landed on her house at Balakot, Uri around noon on June 13. Her mother and toddler brother were killed when the shell landed on their thatched roof.

Her neighbours, who are labourers, find it difficult to buy medicines for her but it is also hard for them to turn down her request to bring fruits for her. The girl assures them their her father would return their money as soon as he comes to see her.

"The poor child does not understand that labourers like us spend on eating whatever we earn in the day. And it is out of this meagre amount that we take care of our children and also buy medicines for her," says Abdul Majid, Naseem's neighbour.

Though they have learnt to cope with her mood swings, what worries them most is the thought of her future. With no compensation coming from the government, they fear this young girl will have no option but to beg for a living. "I am not even able to earn two square meals for my family. How can I adopt her?" asks Rehman, another neighbour.

Naseem is just one of the several children living along the Line of Control in Nambla, Boniyar and Kupwara, who have lost their parents to the shelling from across the border. Till date, the administration has not come to their rescue.

Sheikh Hussain, Deputy Commissioner, Baramulla, says they can provide relief to these children only after receiving reports from the tehsildars of their areas. In Nambla, the villagers have resentment against the tehsildar as well. Says an agitated villager: "We feel the tehsildar is yet to find a vehicle to visit our village."

Surjit Singh, the tehsildar of Baramulla, on his part, blames paucity of funds for the delay.

The villagers are also sore that Mohammad Shafi Uri, now a minister in the Farooq Abdullah government, is yet to visit the constituency. Says Hamid Parey, a resident of Balakot: "We voted him to power, and today he doesn't bother to listen to our pleas."