Nepal's children bear the brunt

Five-year-old Abhijit Sutar shivered as he pulled a tarpaulin sheet over him to beat the cold on Wednesday night as rains drenched this city.

His father Basant, a plumber settled in Neukha, about 10 km from here, had trekked to the capital in the hope of making a trip to their home state Odisha when the quake struck on Saturday.

Children have taken the hardest hit since the 7.9 temblor shook Nepal, with every parent praying that similar woes do not befall them again.

Two-year-old Yashraj is carried by his doting father Mukesh Jaiswal, shielding him from the elements with the hope of hitching a bus-rid to his native Motihari in Bihar.

“For the past six days and five nights we have taken shelter in a tent, exposed to the sun and rain,” Mukesh told Deccan Herald.

“We have got no food, no water. We are ready to pay but cannot get anything to feed my two children,” he said. Mukesh ran a juice centre in Kathmandu. The quake has destroyed his home of 15 years but he is determined to return to Nepal once life returns to normal.

“As the sheer devastation of the earthquake becomes clearer, we know that children have been the most affected by this disaster,” says Roger Hodgson, Deputy Country Director for Save the Children in Nepal.

Sleeping outdoors

Tens of thousands of children spent a fifth night sleeping outdoors in the pouring rain, unable or simply too afraid to return to their homes. Many sustained injuries in the earthquake or have seen their family members hurt or killed.

Doctors at the Bir Hospital told Deccan Herald that they have treated 50 children, most with head injuries, since Saturday’s quake.

According to Unicef, an estimated 1.7 million children were in urgent need of help in areas worst-hit by the earthquake.

“The lives of so many children have been torn apart and they are in desperate need of life-saving support, including clean water, shelter and sanitation,” Tomoo Hozumi, Unicef Nepal Representative, said in a statement.

“Without safe water, waterborne diseases remain a huge risk for children. Many families are struggling simply to protect themselves from the sun and rain and we only expect needs to grow in the coming days as we receive more information from remote areas and the full scale of the disaster becomes more apparent,” Hozumi said.