TEETWAL: : Nahila Tariq last saw her father standing on the far bank of the Neelam river in January 2004. Tariq Husain Mir, an Indian spy who made his home in Muzaffarabad after his arrest there in 1994, waved across the river which marks the Line of Control, and shouted out to his daughter, whom he had not seen for 11 years, that he would soon come home.

Since Saturday's devastating earthquake, Ms. Tariq has phoned her father's Muzaffarabad home dozens of times. The phone rings, but there is no answer. While the Tariq family's story is exceptional in its emotional intensity, it is shared by hundreds of quake-hit families in the Tangdhar mountains. In many cases, villagers can see the flattened homes of their relatives just across the LoC — but have no idea if the people they love are alive.

Mir, a Military Intelligence operative, was despatched across the LoC in April 1994. He was arrested on April 25, 1994, just days after his mission to infiltrate terror-training camps in Pakistan was initiated. He spent the next three years in a Muzaffarabad prison. Late in 1997, he was allowed to leave the prison, after he agreed to join the Tehreek-i-Jihad, a major terrorist group. He made several attempts to return home after that, but each failed.

Somewhere down the road, Mir gave up the struggle. He married again, and did his best to forget his family in Tangdhar. That was until January 26, 2004, when villagers in Teetwal, aided by sympathetic Indian military commanders, used their mosque public address system to announce that divided families would gather on the banks of the Neelam, so that relatives divided for decades might at least see each other. Soon, ropes were slung across the river, allowing families to exchange gifts and letters.

Pakistani troops put an end to the informal cross-border gatherings four days later, but the short time was enough to rekindle bonds between families who had not, in some cases, seen each other for decades. Earlier this year, hopes rose when both governments announced that they would build a meeting point on the banks of the Neelam. Bulldozers had begun to level ground for the construction of a meeting point and community hall in Teetwal on the very morning when the earth heaved.

Now, however, that very hope has meant heightened grief. Mohammad Shafi Mughal lost his only son, Hafiz Ahmad, a 12th grade student who was the first literate member of the working class family. Just across the river, however, he can see the destroyed home of his brother, Habibullah Mughal, who crossed the LoC in 1947, never to return. During the January 2004 gathering, Mr. Mughal had learnt his brother was ailing, and that he had three sons. The families exchanged gifts — a packet of dried copra was sent from the Indian side and oranges were returned.

Stories like these abound in the Teetwal area. Habibullah Mughal, another labourer, learnt in January 2004 that his long-lost brother, Abdul Rehman Mughal, had gone on to become a senior bureaucrat in the Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. He had hoped his brother would be able to help the desperately poor family, but now only hopes he has made it through the earthquake alive.

Nishada Aziz, who has spent the last three days with her infants in the open and in biting cold — knows close relatives who visited earlier this year are probably living in much the same way just across the river.

For the Mir family, however, the wait is perhaps most agonising of all. Soon after the January 2004 meeting, Mir made an abortive effort to cross the LoC illegally. One of his legs was blown off in an explosion. He was rescued by Pakistani troops, and spent several months in hospital. Ms. Tariq's brother, Abdul Wahid, visited Pakistan and helped nurse him to health. Six days ago, he returned to India — and his father left the hospital for Muzaffarabad. A family sundered by a border has been broken again — this time by a tragedy humans had no role in making.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail