Quake: three years on

Another big concern is that the Himalayan region lies on a dangerous fault line that extends all the way to Karachi into the Indian Ocean. Because the area marks a collisions zone squashed up between the Eurasian plate, that is moving south, and the Australian-Indian plate, drifting north, and had witnessed two major collisions before, more quakes cannot be ruled out. However, some knowledge has been gained to predict earthquakes and avert large-scale devastation. It is a pity that the authorities paid no attention to some of the scientists who had long been warning of earthquakes hitting Pakistan's northern region. Understandably, it is hard to relocate entire cities but it is relatively easy to shift vulnerable chunks of population like those living on mountain summits and edges. Likewise, Karachi, as it lies on the fault and is honeycombed with high-rise buildings, is vulnerable to a jolt even of a small magnitude.

How the country managed the whole October 8 calamity, indicates that we lack a well-directed disaster management planning. There was for instance no machinery to clear the rubble and save those buried underneath the collapsed structures. The government needs to put its act together and pace up the reconstruction work. Bureaucratic delay and government's noncommittal attitude should now be a thing of past.