In search of family: Youngster missing after 2005 quake returns to Balakot

MANSEHRA: A man on Sunday sought the police department’s help in tracing his family which he claimed to have lost after his school crumbled to ruins in the October 8, 2005 devastating earthquake.“I was sitting in my classroom when tremors jolted Balakot and the building of my school caved in. I was among those blessed students and teachers who got injured but survived,” Ijaz Ahmad, who is in his early 20s, told the Balakot police.He said he was shifted to Rawalpindi for healthcare but someone unknown to him abducted and sold him to brick kilns in Punjab. “I was sold four times in different cities including Pattoki and Kasur and worked as a bonded labourer at brick kilns since then,” Ijaz said. Recalling his childhood days, he told police that he was in the third grade when the tragedy struck him. He said people used to call his father Mohammad Anwar and his mother Naseem Akhtar.A large number of people rushed to the Balakot police station after learning that a young man who had gone missing some 18 years ago as a schoolchild in the devastating earthquake was now in search of his family.

Mohammad Anwar, among them, shed tears crying loudly and said his son whom his family used to call Zaid, and also a student in third grade had gone missing in the earthquake.Tariq Khan, the Balakot police station head, said his department would conduct the DNA test of Ijaz Ahmad to trace his family through the National Database and Registration Authority.“We will carry out the DNA test of Mohammad Anwar to determine if he was Ijaz Ahmad’s father,” he said.