Dear Editor,
As we all are mourning for the Nepal and praying that the loss should be minimum because of the earthquake which shaked the country on 25th April 2015, the memories of 2005 are revived when Kashmir was struck by the same natural calamity. A decade has passed since the Kashmir earthquake but the question is still same “How safe are the people of Jammu and Kashmir” or let me put it in this way “How prone are the people of Jammu and Kashmir to earthquakes”. Have we learnt a lesson and is it really earthquake which is responsible for the loss or we are equal stakeholders for our negligence.
It’s a old saying that “Earthquake does not kill people but faulty structures do”. We all are very much aware that how casual we are when we think of constructing a house, all what is in our mind is cost of the structure but it should be kept in mind always that our State comes in the most active part of seismic zones and any earthquake of the highest intensities can strike the State at any second, so if we are cutting our cost on quality are we not bidding very low on our lives.
Getting plans and maps sanctioned from the government departments is a left hand game, all what is required is money. No one bothers to get their structure checked by the professionals, they trust a masson more than a civil engineer because they want to cut their cost there too. Its a very big tragedy that how without proper testing of soil and very improper civil engineer designes government has given nod to many such structures for
construction. By doing this are we not digging our own grave in our so called home? And God forbid if tomorrow an earthquake strikes this State and there are losses of life and property who will be accountable God or we ourselves.
It’s a high time we should come out of the attitude of negligence, though earthquake cannot be predicted but we have enough time for improvisation. Its better to stay in a two room well designed and good quality structure than to live in a multistory building of cards. We all should make a commitment with our selves that we won’t ignore the quality. It’s better to be prepared for this problem because any loss is very difficult to compensate and if it is a loss of life it is loss forever. We should take a very important lesson form the Nepal tragedy and commit with our selves that we won’t compromise at least with ourselves.
Sahil Kishore Sharma (Civil Engineer)
Jammu