Quake aftermath

Advani gheraoed

GANDHIDHAM, JAN. 31. The Union Home Minister, Mr. L.K. Advani, was gheraoed by agitated residents of this town who complained of ``gross neglect'' by the State administration in respect of rescue and relief operations.

Mr. Advani was told that neither the District Collector nor any police official visited the area after the quake. The Minister directed the State Urban Development Minister, Mr. Parmanand Khattar, to look into the problems.

- PTI

Mother for Murtaza

JAIPUR, JAN. 31. A Jaipur-based woman, Sahiba Khan, has expressed her desire to adopt the eight-month-old boy Murtaza Ali, who was rescued after 80 hours from the debris in Bhuj on Tuesday. The boy was found on the lap of his deceased mother. Sahiba is married and has three children.

VHP gesture

AHMEDABAD, JAN. 31. The VHP and an orphanage set up by close associates of Mahatma Gandhi have decided to adopt children orphaned in the quake. The Nadiad-based Hindu Anathashram, set up in 1908, has appealed to the State Government, the people and others engaged in relief work, to send orphaned children to the Ashram for raising them as responsible citizens.

``The VHP was taking the responsibility to adopt all those children who have lost their parents and relatives in the ravaging earthquake,'' the working president of the VHP, Mr. Ashok Singhal, said here last night.

Alive after 118 hours

AHMEDABAD, JAN. 31. Fire officials cut an 18-feet deep path through the debris of a residential complex to pull out a woman who had spent 118 hours inside it. For the brother of the fifty- year-old Jyotsana Vasant Kumar Gandhi, who lived in the Shraddha Apartments (now flattened) in Paldi, to see her alive after 118 hours was a miracle.

After the rescue, Mr. Bipin Patel, brother of Ms. Gandhi, told UNI that ``he had lost all hope and had just gone to retrieve the bodies of his sister's family''.

- UNI

CPWD buildings intact

NEW DELHI, JAN. 31. The Government today said no building of the Central Public Works Department (CPWD) collapsed in the earthquake. The Urban Development Minister, Mr. Jagmohan, was informed by senior officials that because of sound structural designing, no CPWD building, including multi-storeyed ones, collapsed.

- PTI

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