On Thursday 13th Dec we left for Pathargaat which is in the heart of
the cyclone effected area. I only slept an hour last night due to
freezing to death to keep the mosquitoes away.I also kept hearing
footsteps which made me further paranoid and kept my rucksack very
close to.We left at 730am and reached Pathargaat at 11 o clock, we did
stop on way for tea and to change the jeep as our one had snapped the
shock absorber.The road to Pathargaat has a 24Km section which is none
existent and is particularly bad if you had a big breakfast.

We reached the town of Podha ,district Pathagaat, and we were met by Mr

Siddique the coordinator for the 3 villages of Podha.Podha is on the
banks of river Bolasar.The damage caused by the cyclone is exactly the
same as the one in east India Orrissa in 1999.The village is next to
where the river meets the sea (Bay Of Bangal ),so when the cyclone hit
it carried the sea inland via the river.

The local school was totally destroyed as well as most of the
houses.The school lost 25 kids out of the 125, the school is now housed

in a couple of tents. The ponds which provide the people with water are

all polluted by sea water,the paddy fields have been destroyed too.The
surrounding village roads have been severely damaged.The workers from
BRAC are doing a fantastic job by providing the local people with paid
jobs so they can be back on their feet.

There is a desperate need for clean drinking water and long term
rehabilitation. After a survey of the area i sat down with Mr Siddique
and concluded that with the assistance from BRAC Khalsa Aid would like
to provide short term drinking water and also construct some natural
(sand,pebbles ) water filter plants for the long term. The cost of
water filtration plants varies from 60000TAKA TO 90000TAKA ($2US =
135TAKA).The ponds in the immediate area will be drained and refilled
so that the sea water was taken away then pond water will be filtered
for drinking purposes.Each ponds costs 2500TAKA to clean.I have
instructed Mr Siddique to look for water tanks and also a tanker to
refill the tanks every 2 days.I will be meetiing BRACs head of
purchasing in Dhaka over the weekend to discuss the purchase through
them so we can get better price .

i had a very bad cold and felt extremely tired.i just wanted to hit the

bed. Mr Alamghir sent a sweet dish of Samia and rusgulha to my room.
That was very kind of him and i felt a bit better. I managed to sleep 4

hours so wasn't that bad ,that's all down to someone putting a mosquito

net over my bed .We will be leaving for Dhaka at 7am following
morning.....ANOTHER 8 HOURS ON THE ROAD WITH MY SUPER SLOW SNAIL OF A DRIVER..He keeps telling everyone that he drives slow because his a
safe driver.HE WONT BE SAFE FROM ME IF HE DOESN'T START GOING OVER
50KM....

.Got to remember to take the mosquito cream back to the shop,it didnt
work, i put it on the mosquito but it still bit me.

Khalsa Aid can only do these relief operations because of the kind
donations from the Sangat.

Waheguru Ji Ka Khalsa
Waheguru Ji Ki Fateh

Ravinder Singh

Dhaka,Bangladesh

For more details on the Bangladesh project.... BLOG report