Battling Nature

The recent earthquake in Gujarat has thrown up images that are a mixture of the cruel destruction caused by an unknown whim of Nature and the incredible courage shown by those who are fighting for survival, says G. N. DEVY.

ON January 26, I turned on the TV, as I do every year, to watch the R-day parade. Accidentally, I clicked the local Gujarati Channel, which was telecasting news from Ahmedabad. What I saw was the most hilarious thing I have ever seen on a TV screen. In the middle of a news headline, the newsreader first looked left, then right and, jumping off his seat, made a quick exit. The curtain behind him was the only image left on the screen.

My wife and I burst out laughing. The Bengali writer Mahasveta Devi, who was with us, wanted to know the reason for our laughter. As I was trying to explain to her, a strange noise started emanating from everywhere, the window panes, doors, walls shook violently. We knew it was a quake. We rushed out of the house, but the tremors had stopped. We returned to the TV, however, it showed no images.

In no time we all but forgot about the tremors, and started our day's work. Among other things, there was a police case involving a tribal. Sometime, in the afternoon, we went to the deputy superintendent's office. The police control room was all agog with reports pouring in. One said that 300 had died in Ahmedabad. I remembered the TV newsreader rushing out of the newsroom. Obviously, the quake had hit Ahmedabad a minute before it picked on Baroda. But the magnitude and devastation caused by it was not clear. The telephone lines were in no mood to cooperate. The only source of information was the TV.

By early evening, Baroda was full of rumours. By midnight, bits and pieces of information had started falling in place. Kutch had been hit very badly; perhaps 5000 had died, perhaps 60,000. The intensity was perhaps 7.9, perhaps 6.9. Ahmedabad was hit equally badly, but the death toll was not known. Surat too had been hit. So was Navsari. The north, the west, the south - all hit by the earthquake, the worst of the last century and half; and yet Baroda had miraculously escaped. Through that night we tried to get more information, to find out if our friends were safe. It was clear that a massive relief act had to be put together in the shortest possible time.

Next morning, Mahasveta Devi, the painter Bhupen Khakhar and I signed an appeal for help and sent it to various newspapers and TV channels. I called a meeting of my colleagues and explained a plan of action. And we left for Ahmedabad. From the outskirts, the city looked normal. We looked for signs of the earthquake on every multi-storied building. But it was only when we reached the circuit house area that we realised how ghastly the aftermath had been. Huge crowds and battling police could not conceal the wreck of houses which had collapsed to form debris. There were not enough cranes to clear it.

Mahasveta Devi left for Calcutta with tears in her eyes, and I came back to Baroda depressed as never before. But when I reached my office, late at night, I was stunned to see a small mountain of clothes lying in the rooms, in the open space outside, and quite a group of volunteers who had gathered there. There were blankets, food packets, glucose powder, syringes and candles; and more material was pouring in every few minutes. I had not imagined that the response to an appeal that had not even been published as yet would be so overwhelming. The appeal appeared in the press the next day; and since then the flow of materials to carry to Bhuj has not stopped.

The problem before me then was how to send the material and where? Till Monday noon, we had no exact news about Kutch. An advance party had left for Kutch with three vehicles on Sunday morning. It managed to reach Anjar, which was as badly devastated as Bhuj, the district headquarters of Kutch, but had received little help by then. They could not contact me as telephone lines were still down.

But through satellite communication a message came by Monday afternoon. The volunteers, mostly tribal boys, had established a camp in a village near Anjar. The second lot of volunteers had crossed a broken bridge in Surendranagar district and they too were heading towards Anjar. By late night, three batches of volunteers had managed to establish a link. The news they send every few hours is a mixture of the cruel destruction caused by an unknown whim of Nature and the incredible courage shown by those who are trying to fight the stroke.

The images of a long line of trucks, the rescue teams, the shattered homes and the all-enveloping wreckage are already a part of the contemporary global media. The VVIPs have already started making their visits and adding to the burden of an already exhausted State machinery.

The flow of aid is trickling in to console and assist those who have survived. One does not know how many really died. Some say 200,000, some 30,000. The official versions of truth are being drafted and re-drafted.

But, what is remarkable is that the little sweeper girl in my locality gave away an entire month's salary of Rs. 100 to the relief fund. The tribal boys, who offered to be volunteers, have gone to Kutch without having any spare clothes.

Most of my colleagues have spent many nights without sleep and have worked to set up a rescue and relief operation. Nature has its wisdom and whims; and the human species has its will to survive. The four days after that terrible day have been, for me, the most moving experience. I wish it had come with far less agony.

The author is engaged in documentation of tribal literature and is Secretary for Denotified and Nomadic Tribes' Rights Action Group.

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