Peshawar suicide blast: Aspirations cut short

There was screaming everywhere around the area… everyone was calling for help: Eyewitness.

PESHAWAR:

An excited Jannat and her mother Shabana Kauser had just left their home. The two were on their way to Saddar Bazaar; Jannat, 13, had just passed her class 4 exams and needed books to begin her new term in class 5.

Shabana and Jannat’s journey ended prematurely, however. The mother and daughter were among the 12 people killed in Friday’s suicide attack targeting the Frontier Constabulary commandant’s convoy at the busy Fakhre-e-Alam Road.

“There was screaming everywhere around the area… everyone was calling for help,” recalled eyewitness Muhammad Amir.

“I received severe injuries on my leg myself… my friend had to carry me on his back, before we were picked up by an ambulance and taken to the hospital,” he added. Amir and his friend had been in the area to submit some documents at a local bank. They were just leaving when the suicide attacker blew up his vest.

Both Shabana and Jannat’s bodies had been heavily mutilated in the blast. They remained at the morgue for hours, as rescue workers waited for someone to identify them.

Some among them mistook the two for beggars, given their condition following the incident.

“I think I have seen her begging with her daughter in Saddar Bazaar… but there is nothing which can help us contact her family members,” said the rescue worker standing beside her at the morgue. The workers were also cautious not to let anyone other than relatives see their bodies.

Eventually, Shabana’s husband Rafiullah, himself an army official on duty in Peshawar, reached the morgue. Distraught, Rafiullah told rescue workers that he could not contact his wife and daughter who had been at the bazaar in the morning. He had a premonition that they might have fallen victim to the blast; that he soon found out was true.

Rafiullah immediately recognised his wife and daughter when he was shown their bodies by the workers, and called his relatives to help retrieve them. Rafiullah arrived at the hospital, accompanied by his three other children, but he could not bring himself to tell them their mother and sister were dead.

“They left the house to buy new books for young Jannat… she had just been promoted to her new class,” was all Rafiullah, who hails from Punjab, said. He opted against talking to the media further, choosing instead to remain stoic, given his service obligations.


Published in The Express Tribune, March 30^th, 2013.