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| Investigation of Bajaur suicide attack started: 'Can't face the eyes of relatives' A teacher could not save his student |
Today in Bajaur Qayamat is small. A relative of every village, nation, and tribe has died in this incident, and everyone is mourning.
Habibur Rahman, the shift in charge of Rescue 1122 of Bajaur in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, had reached the spot two minutes after the explosion took place at the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F) workers' convention on Sunday.
It was on Sunday when Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F) workers were present in large numbers at a convention of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F) workers in the Bajaur tribal district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa when an explosion took place that killed 45 people and injured 150 so far.
It should be noted that the FIR of the Bajaur blast has been registered under the provisions of terrorism in the state's complaint against unknown terrorists.
According to the FIR, there was an explosion in the assembly hall at 4:10 PM during the Workers' Convention of Jamaat Ulema-e-Islam F in Bajaur.
Habib-ur-Rehman told the BBC that "Many of the injured were shouting 'Save us, save us.' Some were completely still. They were in a state of shock and fear.
One of the injured was in terrible condition. He anxiously told me to take him to the hospital, save me. I did CPR to revive him but he stopped breathing.
Habibur Rahman said that after transferring the injured in the ambulance, we collected the scattered bodies and their organs.
He said that I had moved 15 bodies to the mortuary with my colleagues. All these were local people.
Seven bodies were unidentifiable. No one had a head, so someone's face was blown off.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police say that according to initial investigation, it was apparently a suicide attack.
Provincial Police Chief Akhtar Hayat Khan has told reporters that 10 kg of explosives have been used in the blast, while ball bearings have also been recovered from the scene.
The outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has condemned the blast while showing indifference.
Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif expressed his condolences to JUI chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman, leaders and workers, and the affected families on this incident and has sought a report from Federal Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah and the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government.
What did eyewitnesses and rescue officials see?
The blast took place when JUIF's workers' convention was going on in Tehsil Khar.
According to eyewitness Masroor Khan, who was on the road outside the venue, the blast occurred when a local leader Maulvi Abdul Shakoor was calling another leader of the Jamaat, Maulana Ziaullah Jan, onto the stage for a speech. At the same time, "there was a terrible explosion."
According to Masroor Khan, "I felt that the explosion happened very close to the stage, after which clouds of smoke covered it." Screams were heard throughout the venue. Injured and dead bodies were everywhere.
According to another eyewitness, the sound of the explosion was heard far away, shaking the nearby buildings.
Shahid Abdul Hanan was also injured in this blast. "When we arrived, the convention was going on and there was a lot of rush near the stage, so we couldn't go ahead," he told the BBC.
That's when the explosion happened. I was also injured. At first, nothing was understood, but then people arrived there and the work of transporting the injured and dead bodies to the hospital was started.
"Maulana Ziaullah didn't stop despite stopping Haqqani"
Maulana Jamaluddin, a member of the National Assembly, was the chief guest of this worker convention of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam. He says that he was delayed in reaching the convention because of prayer.
Maulana Jamaluddin tells that Maulana Ziaullah Jan Haqqani, the young Amir of JUIF in Tehsil Khar, had been working for this worker convention for a long time.
He was with me 15 minutes before the blast. I had arrived after a long journey, so I thought I would go to the meeting place after eating and praying. I told Maulana Ziaullah Jan Haqqani that we will go after eating together, but he did not agree and said I will go and see the arrangements, I will welcome you to the meeting place.
"I was talking to people after eating and praying when I was informed that an explosion had occurred."
"The dead body of my student was lying in front of me."
Samiullah, a volunteer of Al-Khidmat Foundation, reached the nearby hospital for relief activities after the explosion during the workers' convention of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F) in Bajaur district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
Seeing Nasrullah's dead body, he recognized him as his disciple. Samiullah also works as a teacher at Eden Model Public School in Bajaur.
Samiullah said that 10 minutes after the explosion, he reached the hospital where two seriously injured died in his hands.
He said that these two were residents of our area and I knew both of them. There was a Jamshid. It was seriously injured. I rushed to give him first aid but unfortunately, he had died.
He said that Nasrullah was also seriously injured.
His condition was very different. But Nasra like JamshedLilla also could not bear the injuries. Seeing his dead body was a very difficult step. But I had to wait for the families of both.
Samiullah says that Nasrullah's family thought he was merely injured.
They were still thinking that Nasrallah would be injured, but Nasrallah was already dead. He told me that Nasrallah is your disciple. I said yes, he was my student, now you take him home.
Saying that I moved away from his sight I no longer dared to stand next to Nasrallah's body. Nor could I face the eyes of his family that a teacher could not save his student.
He said that Nasrullah had given his ninth-class board exam and was now studying in the tenth class.
Explosive intensity
Amjad Niaz is the Operational Emergency Officer at Bajaur Reseco.
He says that officials from the office of Reseco 1122, located near the site of the incident, had reached the blast site within two minutes.
When I reached the spot, our officials were busy in rescue. The injured were scattered all over the venue. There were dead bodies everywhere. The body parts of many bodies had been separated.
In this situation, the first duty of rescue personnel is to save the lives of the injured and our personnel were transferring the injured to ambulances after first aid. We completed the entire operation in four hours.
A police official said that the rush had increased after the blast. It was necessary to keep the road open for vehicles transporting the injured to the hospital. Apart from ambulances, big and small vehicles had reached the spot to take the injured to the hospital for medical assistance.
Medical Superintendent Dr. Liaquat Ali told BBC that the hospital was operated according to its capacity and 17 injured persons were flown to Peshawar by helicopter while some injured were transferred to Tamargarh district hospital.
Increase in militancy in Bajaur
During the last one and a half years, incidents of extremism have increased in Bajaur and there have been several attacks on the leaders of Jamiat Ulema Islam in particular.
In the last two years, religious leaders were targeted in many of the target groups, most of whom were Jamiat leaders.
Maulana Gul Naseeb was killed and his colleague Mufti Shafiullah was seriously injured due to firing by unknown persons in Tehsil Mamond of Bajaur on April 10 this year.
Earlier in November 2022, Qari Ilyas, the leader of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, was killed by unknown persons at Dumma Dola.
Similarly, two incidents took place in April 2022, in one incident, Mufti Bashir was shot dead, while in the other incident, Mufti Shafiullah, who was an essential member of Jamiat and a teacher of Arabic in a local school, was targeted. He was a teacher.
He was killed in a roadside bomb blast.