Frantic activities as life goes on
Xari Jalil
LAHORE: An Edhi worker pulls off a “piece of evidence” hanging from a barbed wire and puts it inside a plastic bag. Half an hour has passed and no one knows much about it, but the bomb blast has left the public and the police shaken and disturbed.
“We were on duty at the petrol station. When the blast took place, there was a deafening sound and a lot of smoke but we stayed here,” says a worker at a nearby filling station. A lot many who were there began running towards the main road near Radio Pakistan building.
A double-door van had caught fire but the Rescue 1122 has tried to hose it down. Now there is thick black smoke billowing out of the van. Eyewitnesses say a hefty man, wearing a black chador, was seen walking around the area.
They say he came from the side of the road which leads to the railway station. And senior police officials have already stated that a head has been found which is now in their custody. Presumably, he tried to enter the Police Lines but ended up blasting himself where he stood. Burnt cars, crashed windowpanes, and a concrete pole with a huge crack in it show that.
“Since four or five years we have been hearing of the police headquarters and the Police Lines being under threat,” says Imran Qadir, who is a resident of the area and an eyewitness. He is one of the people who have helped the blast victims. He looks worryingly at the crowd trying to approach the blast scene, even though it is surrounded by a yellow “Crime Scene” tape written on it.
“These people should not be here,” he says. “Another blast can always go off.” Every citizen it seems has the knowledge of what to do in case of a bomb blast.
The police have managed to push back the general public and have put up a purple tent so no vehicles can pass. On the opposite side of the crime scene, a carpet shop has lost all its windows. Everywhere blue tinted glass is scattered on the ground, and workers are trying to brush them aside.
A piece of glass crashes down all of a sudden and people jump in fear. There is splattered blood even across the road, and bits of human bodies lying in small puddles of rainwater. A shoe is seen lying nearby, its sole bloody.
Despite putting up barriers and crime scene tapes, though, forensic teams cannot be seen anywhere on the road. Instead workers of the FIF (Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation) - the social welfare wing of the banned JuD (Jamaatud Dawa) -- is picking up body pieces and collecting them in an ordinary plastic bag.
“We are doing our duty,” says one of the workers at the task. He opens the bag and shows its contents – blackened bits of brain, and what appear to be skull bones. “We intend to give this to the police once we are done,” he assures.
“I have tried to help the injured,” says one man. “Some were already dead, and some were in a very bad way so we helped by giving them water first then transporting them to the ambulances. One man died in my arms as I tried to help him up.” He looks grim, like he might never smile again.
A couple rushes down a narrow lane to their home behind the Police Lines building. “We were going to pick up our daughter from the school nearby and the blast happened right in front of my eyes. Windowpanes crashed down and we did not know what to do. I think my child must have been saved by seconds because she was almost there.”
“She is so scared and confused,” says the father. “She says she saw a police man fall down hard and started crying.”
A junior-level policeman, who had come from his duty at the Governor House, says there was already a threat this morning about the attackers entering Lahore. “They knew, and were mentally prepared. But what can be done, about a man who has come to die? If we cordon off this part of the city, he will blow himself up somewhere else.
The acrid smoke by now has been dispersed but the dense metallic smell of blood, pools of which have been spilled on the road, still hangs in the air. While many people are still standing by watching developments, most of the crowd has dispersed two hours later. Life must go on.
Published in Dawn February 18th , 2015
