Jamrud blast: Mechanics, taxi drivers pay the cost of conflict

Assistant political agent says some of the bodies are mutilated beyond recognition.

PESHAWAR: Taxi drivers, cleaners and mechanics were a victim of coincidence in the deadly explosion that killed 17 people in Jamrud Bazaar.

Among the dead were women and children, while more than 40 people were injured in the bus stand explosion on Monday.

Fourteen bodies were shifted to the Civil Hospital Jamrud and nearly 45 wounded victims were rushed to the Hayatabad Medical Complex (HMC). However, three people died on the way.

Terrified relatives, who brought the victims in private cars, walked the corridors of the hospital. “I brought passengers from Rawalpindi to Jamrud Bazaar and we were waiting at the bus stop when suddenly there was a huge explosion. There was smoke and human flesh everywhere,” said Arshad Hussain, a taxi driver from Rawalpindi, who sustained a head injury.

Hussain had pieces of the shattered windscreen stuck in his head, while his three passengers had minor wounds.

“I was repairing an engine of a car when a powerful blast jolted the entire area and the door fell and hit my leg. When I stepped out of the shop, I heard injured women and children shouting for help,” said a 13-year-old mechanic Rehmanullah lying in the surgical ward.

Fazlullah, whose nephew Samin Jan was killed in the blast, said the deceased and injured were poor people. “None of them had caused any harm to the militants. Whoever has done this has destroyed the families of the poor.”

“I was eating at a nearby restaurant when a car part hit my back and leg. I looked back and thought that someone had opened fire at me, but it was the whole bazaar that had been destroyed,” said a bus driver Abdul Razzak.

Speaking to journalists at the hospital, Jamrud Assistant Political Agent Jehangir Azam Wazir said it needs to be investigated who or what the main target of the explosion was. “Those killed and injured were innocent people of the area.”

“It was a very powerful explosion. Some of the bodies were mutilated and the identities could not be immediately ascertained.”

Jamrud Bazaar is situated near the historic Bab-e-Khyber on the mountainous Peshawar-Torkham Road, which connects Afghanistan with Pakistan.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 18^th, 2012.