Irshad Bibi - a beacon of light for afflicted

A report on Irshad Bibi, who works in Pearl Valley Public School, a project of KEF, appeared on the front page of one of the most popular english daily newspapers "The News" on Friday November 18, 2005. Irshad Bibi, whose house was destroyed in the October 8 earthquake, was being honored for her services to the school. Here is a snapshot of the ceremony held last week in Pearl Valley School.

KEF Relief activities get coverage in media

The NEWS (Jang Group) - Saturday November 12, 2005


Pakistan Observer, Wednesday, November 23, 2005

Bahrain donors chose KEF for providing shelters

This report appeared in Bahrain's newspaper "Gulf Daily News" on November 26, 2005.

"BAHRAIN donations will finance the building of 'new concept' shelters designed for adverse weather conditions in Pakistan's earthquake stricken Kashmir territories.

Discover Islam has used money raised in Bahrain to pay for 100 trench-style shelters to house earthquake victims through the Kashmir Education Foundation at Rawalakot."

KEF has provided over 600 shelters - 400 more in next week

Kashmir Education Foundation has provided over 600 shelters, mostly in Rawalakot area for the earthquake affectees, while another 400 will be dispatched during the current week.The Foundation plans to set up upto 2000 shelters by mid December subject to availability of funds. It has a capacity to fabricate as many as 200 shelters daily and has developed an efficient logistic set up to deliver these to the affected areas. The project is fully supported by the Army personnel deployed in the area.

It may be added that Kashmir Education Foundation is a charity NGO dedicated to provision of high quality education to the rural children and training of female teachers for English medium school. However, considering the enormity of devastation caused by earthquake, the Foundation launched a relief operation immediately after the earthquake and dispatched hundreds of truck loads of food, blankets, tents and medicines to Rawalakot, Muzaffarabad and Balakot areas.

A sample of shelter developed by the Foundation has been displayed in Chaklala Scheme I, and can be replicated by other NGOs.

Providing Shelter

KEF is actively working with military to provide shelters to far flung areas. KEF volunteers on a mission.

Upcoming fund-raisers in UK

Mark your calenders.

December 3, 2005: Sponsored Walk around Willen Lake. This is a 3 mile walk around one of the lakes in Milton Keynes (MK). It is being organised by Pakistani/Muslim ladies based in and around MK area. Everyone is welcome to participate provided they are sponsored by individuals and/or corporations.

January 21, 2006: Food, muscial evening, raffle and auction. The plan is to get donations in material terms from various companies in and around MK area which will be placed in the raffle or auctioned on the day.

KEF representatives will be invited to give a brief talk about KEF aims and objectives and current disaster relief activities.

Reminders will be sent as the activities draw closer!

Shelter prototype installed in Rawalpindi

KEF has installed a demonstration shelter in Rawaplindi in Chaklala Scheme No. 1. This is for the benefit of other relief agencies who want to replicate the winter shelter in other areas. Structural engineers from civil and army have inspected this and are satisfied that it will withstand the severe conditions weather above the snow line.

The Government of Pakistan have requested KEF today to install a similar demonstration shelter in Islamabad so that other relief agencies can benefit form this design.

PVPS is now open

KEF’s Pearl Valley School is now open and children smiling once again. Locals are picking up pieces and trying to get some sort of normalcy to their lives.

Update on Shelter Installation

Seeing families living in winter shelters gave us one of the greatest satisfactions in life and I am sure it would make the donors proud – It was a pleasure to see the efforts of all KEF volunteers turn into reality.

The work on fabrication of winter shelters and their installation in Rawalakot is continuing. We are pleased to say that our initial program of installing the shelters around Rawalakot has been expanded to cover the whole of Rawalakot District, althoughwe are limited to what we can supply due to lack of funds. Please bear in mind that there are 10,000 houses affected in Rawalakot District – and the best we will be able to do with the pledged funds will be 1000 shelters in the next 20 days, although we have capacity to install 3000.The breakthrough has come due to the Pakistan Army offering their men to take KEF shelters and install them in Rawalakot District – starting from the highest peaks and working their way downwards. In addition the Army is facilitating KEF efforts in Rawalpindi in a big way that has enabled us to increase our capacity to deliver 3000 Shelters.In and around Rawalakot 320 shelters have been supplied/installed and families (about 200) already taken refuge in them. They have made these their home for the time being as you will see in the attached photos.

Citizen Foundation has also pledged KEF 500 of their own shelters for Rawalakot area. In addition World Bank is talking to us to see how they can support us in this effort in the limited time we have after that would be silent deaths due to cold.

KEF on Aaj TV

Aaj TV telecasted a documentary on KEF today (Sunday, November 13, 2005). It focused on the high quality construction standard of Pearl Valley Public School in Rawalakot, preventing it from any damage from the earthquake, and compared it with the other buildings in the Rawalakot area, that suffered catastrophic damage.

The documentary highlighed that before the construction of PVPS began, proper soil analysis was done and the building was constructed against an earthquake of Richter scale 8.0. While the original construction cost increased by nearly 25%, the structures survived the massive earthquake of October 8 without any damage and all of nearly 300 children and staff in the school remained safe.

Tetanus Inoculation in Rawalakot

In addition, 700 children have been inoculated against tetanus in Rawalakot. The injections are other logistics of dispensing were arranged under most hygienic conditions in Pearl Valley Public School.

KEF Earthquake Rehabilitation Program on net

Details of KEF's Earthquake Rehabilitation Program and images of shelters were posted on the website of Small Kindness, a registered charity by Yusuf Islam. Read

KEF Shelters

KEF has designed special shelters for the homeless. The details of the shelter are on the website. These shelters are for survival only. The design of the shelters is indigenous and customized for the specific requirements.

Our target is to provide 500 shelters by end of Noevember.

KEF Earthquake Rehabilitation Program

KEF has launched Earthquake Rehabilitation Program for the relief and rehabilitation of affected people from the October 8 Earthquake. You can find the details here.