WALK ON RECONSTRUCTION

OF
EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTES

Organized By: Press For Peace(PFP)

Supported By: Action Aid
October 7-8, 2009

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Background
The 2005 Kashmir Earthquake (also known as the South Asian earthquake or the Great
Pakistan earthquake) was a major earthquake centered in Pakistan-adminstrated Kashmir and in
North West Frontier Province (NWFP) near the city of Muzaffarabad, Pakistan. It occurred at
08:52:37 Pakistan Standard Time on 8 October 2005. It registered a debatable moment magnitude
of 7.6. As of 8 November, the government of Pakistan's official death toll was 79,000, while
officials say nearly 1,400 people also died in Indian Kashmir and four people in Afghanistan. The
severly affected Districts of AJ&K were Muzaffarabad, Bagh and Rawalakot. The severity of the
damage caused by the quake is attributed to severe upthrust, coupled with poor construction.

Remarkable efforts were made by national and international organizations to rehabilitate the
earthquake victims. The most severely affected part of the infrastructure was of education sector.
Thousands of schools were collapsed due to substandard construction and in spur-of-the-moment
thousands of teachers and students were died in the schools, colleges and university.

Rationale

The main factor that helps to take the communities out of the traumatized situation is
rehabilitation of Educational Institutions. It helps them to regain the routine life and gives students
and children psychological relief to resume their education. The delay in the reconstruction of
educational institutes not only causes the wastage of precious time of generation but also their
abilities are disintegrated and they remain unable to overcome trauma. For proper education and
related activities a congealing environmental conditions and standard facilities are required
without which the efforts to impart education go in vain. To ensure timely reconstruction of
infrastructure, continuous efforts are required on behalf of key-stakeholders to push the duty
bearers. Four years have been passed to catastrophic earthquake but the statistics shows that the
duty-bearers and line departments remain unable to rehabilitate and reconstruct the most vital part
of social infrastructure i.e. Educational Institutes. Out of estimated 2835 Educational Institutes
only 220 have been completed so for, which is approximately 8% of the total.

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The Activity

Since the reconstruction of Educational Institutes is delayed and a generation is suffering, it is

the high time to force and push the concerned agencies, Government departments and
organizations to accelerate the process of reconstruction. To this end Press For Peace (PFP)
in collaboration with Action Aid arranged advocacy events in the three affected Districts of
Azad Kashmir i.e. Muzaffarabad, Bagh and Rawlakot. The event comprised of walks in the
three Districts in which the key-stakeholders including students ( from Primary level to Degree
level), teachers, community representatives, community activists, members of civil society
organizations, media personnels, representatives of national and international organizations
participated proactively.

Objective

The main objective of these walks was to highlight the issue of delay in the reconstruction of
Educational Institutes and put the attention of concerned authorities towards it and resolve it on
priority basis.

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 Arrangements for the walk

Press For Peace (PFP) utilized its already existing volunteers in all three districts who
voluntarily extended their support to mobilize key-stakeholders including, teachers, and
students of all ages both male and female, community representatives, civil society members,
journalists, community activists, representatives from trade unions and the officials of
different national and international organizations. Requests letters were disseminated to
School Management Committees to ensure their participation in the events. The management
committees were constituted to arrange for the walks in all three districts. Management
committees were asked to build a strong liaison with the media so a comprehensive coverage
of the event would be made possible.

Highlights of the walks

1. District Muzaffarabad ( Capital of AJ&K)

The major event held at Muzaffarabad on October 7, 2009 in which more the 600
individuals including children, students (male & female) from government school in the
city as well as from the villages and other key-stakeholders participated enthusiastically.
Students were holding banners and play-cards with slogans written on them. These
slogans were highlighting the issue of delay in reconstruction and its worst impacts on
the educational future of students. The walk started from Club Hall near Bank Road and
ended at Central Press Club Muzaffarabad. At the end of walk various students and
community representatives delivered speeches in which they addressed concerned
authorities to initiate and accelerate the process of reconstruction of educational
institutions in the earthquake affected areas of AJ&K.

Students carrying play-cards and banners

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2. District Bagh
Same enthusiasm was seen in the district of Bagh. Here the walk was held on October 7,
2009 in which more than 300 individuals participated. The walk began from Haidri Chowk
main Bazar and ended at Press Club Bagh. In this walk children, teachers, students,
representatives from trade unions and civil society organizations participated and
effectively highlighted the issue of delay in the reconstruction activities. At the end of the
walk community representatives laid a great stress on the line departments to immediately
focus the adverse situation of educational institutes and provide them with the required
facilities without any further delay.

3. District Rawalakot
On October 8, 2009 a walk in the District of Rawalakot was jointly organized by
ActionAid, PFP and Poond Development Forum (PDF) in which more than 250 students
and individuals from different walks of life participated. The walk started from Main Bazar
and ended at District Court Complex. The participants had play-cards and banners in their
hands and at the end speeches were delivered by students and community. The rally was
addressed by Sardar Qadeer, Chairman PDF, Sardar Basheer, Khawaja Khalil,Sardar
Liaqaat and others office bearers of local political parties and NGOs. They urged
government to start the rehabilitation work on City Development Plan and reconstruction
of schools.

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Role of Media

Media Gave extraordinary coverage to these walks. F.M Radio Muzaffarabad & Rawalakot
telecasted special reports regarding the event. At the end of walk BBC and all other T.V
channels telecasted detailed news of this walk and gave encouraging coverage to all the
educational institutes and the students of Azad Kashmir who have been facing bundle of
problems due to poor and grieved condition of their institutes since earthquake of 2005.
International news agencies also delivered press release regarding the event reconstruction.
Similar converge was observed in the media of Indian Administrated Kashmir, which have
also suffered the damages of Earthquake. The overall converge of the Walks, apart from
attracting the attention of policy makers and organizations related to rehabilitation, also
created a public debated about the delaying of educational institutes.

( The details of press releases, news clippings and website links highlighting the activity of
walks in three Districts of AJK, are available in another report)

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Outcomes
• Through series of walks, Key-Stakeholders are now well aware about the main causes of
delay in construction of educational institutes
• Real facts and figures regarding the reconstruction were brought in front of key
stakeholders
• Line departments accepted the delay in construction process and identified constraints
• Thorough media mass awareness campaign is triggered and duty-bearers are pushed to
resolve issues and speed up the process of construction
• Attention of competent authorities from EARRA, SERRA, EEAP are brought to the issue
and they have announced construction of education institutes as a priority issue to be
resolved.

Recommendations

• Continuous and coordinated efforts are required to lay stress on the authorities through
mobilizing general public and other key stakeholders.
• It is seen that mostly the delay is due to the community conflicts on land issues and the
red-tapism of bureaucracy. Therefore there is a need to create a mass awareness amongst
the communities highlighting the importance of Educational Institutes, their rehabilitation
and reconstruction; also there is a need to find out diminutive ways to resolve the issues.
• Community participation must be acquired to influence the duty-bearers and to help in
initiating the reconstruction endeavors.

Lesson Learnt

It is observed that most of the organizations (National & International) are showing least
interest to the said issue. If these are involved proactively to mobilize communities so that a
continuous process is initiated to urge duty-bearers and line departments to resolve the issue
on the priority basis. Although there had been a continuous criticism on Government from
different segment of the society but no practical action was made.

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 Research and Policy Wing

Press For Peace(PFP)

Bank Road Muzaffarabad,

Jammu and Kashmir
Ph: 0092 -5822-445457
Fax: 0092 5822 -445437
Email: info@pressforpeace.org.uk
www.pressforpeace.org.uk

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