PBS Frontline: Cold Comfort

A Battle for Hearts and Minds in the Quake Zone

By Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy

February 21, 2006

For millions of years, the Indian subcontinent has been slowly crashing into the Himalayan Mountains. The earthquake that flattened mountain villages in Pakistan, India and Kashmir on October 8, 2005, was a violent reminder of this tectonic drift. The quake registered at least a 7.6 on the Richter scale. A month later, the death toll stood at more than 87,000. By most accounts, more than 3 million people were left homeless.

In the wake of the disaster, who gets help and from whom has highlighted the already heated politics of the area. In this week's Rough Cut, FRONTLINE/World reporter Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy travels by helicopter to Balakot, the epicenter of the quake. Here she takes us into the tents of women who lost their husbands and children to the earthquake. She visits makeshift clinics overwhelmed by patients, and finds a mix of medicine and religious ideology being dispensed.

Among the many organizations and volunteers that have come to help the earthquake victims are Islamic militant groups, some of which have been labeled as "terrorist" organizations by the U.S. and Pakistani governments. With a wide network of young recruits -- and the ability to move quickly through these remote mountains -- the groups were some of the first to reach the victims. Fighters became relief workers overnight.

Obaid-Chinoy visits one Islamic camp run by Jamaat Ud Dawa, a group outlawed by the government and whose leader, Hafiz Mohammed Saeed, was detained in Lahore recently over the violent cartoon protests. Inside the group's camp in Balakot, Obaid-Chinoy finds a model of efficiency, where there is electricity, running water, mosques and functioning hospitals.

Wearing a modest headscarf and shalwar kameez, our reporter is told by a man carrying a large knife to cover her face before she speaks with Abu Zargam, the camp's leader. He only agrees to an interview with her if she is not filmed sitting next to him.

Zargam has his own explanation for the quake's devastation and the role of Islam in its aftermath. "People here agree that the earthquake came because of mistakes and immoral acts," Zargam tells Obaid-Chinoy. "God wants us to rectify our mistakes and adopt true Islam. People are so happy with us, they think that God has sent them prophets."

His message has found an audience in those who have nothing left to lose. But it doesn't sit well with many of the other relief agencies, and even some villagers doubt the sincerity of the Islamic groups.

"To me," says Obaid-Chinoy, "it seemed as if a battle was waging in the midst of the relief operations, between the Islamic groups and the international relief organizations."

She leaves us with a question: "Who will win the hearts and minds of these people?"

Singeli Agnew
Associate Producer

PBS:http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/rough/2006/02/pakistan_cold_c.html