Internet helps global indians rally for quake aid

["Irfan Khan" <khania@super.net.pk>]

Jan. 31, 2001 

Internet helps global indians rally for quake aid

BY NARAYANAN MADHAVAN

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - There is now a virtual control room to aid 
India's earthquake relief.

Far-flung Gujaratis originating from the quake-ravaged Kutch region 
in western India are harnessing the Internet to organize supplies, 
logistics and search for relatives following last Friday's massive 
earthquake.

Until last week, Panjokutch (Our Kutch) (www.panjokutch.com) was just 
a community Web site that helped arranged marriages, carried travel 
ads and posted job information.

Now it serves as an information hub for quake relief. Its tasks range 
from online registration of aid donors to locating lost relatives.

A message on Panjokutch.com from Shree Swaminarayan Temple in 
Willesden in north London conveys the desperate quest for information 
from relatives far from the disaster scene.

``All the followers of the temple have relatives in Kutch and it has been devastating to have no news of their wellbeing.''

OTHER SITES HELPING

And Panjokutch.com is not the only Web site helping victims of the quake that killed at least 20,000 people.

There are a host of other sites such as www.kutchinfo.com which details specific needs for quake-hit villages.

Gujarati magazines like Chitralekha (www.chitralekha.com) are also part of the effort. And Bombay's Grain, Rice and Oilseed Merchants Association (www.groma.org) has a victim relief site.

AlertNet (www.alertnet.org), run by the Reuters Foundation of global news and information group Reuters Group Plc (RTR.L), is another site helping disaster relief communication.

The loose-knit sites which have sprung up over the last few years have transformed disaster response, coordinating individuals, communities and aid agencies.

Emails are flying across the web, bulletin boards give fast updates and search boxes supply specific information. It is all being used to seek and direct volunteers and truckloads of medicines, food and other supplies.

Pankaj K. Shah, managing trustee of the non-profit S.K. Shah Charitable Trust, which runs Panjokutch.com, said the site's main aim now was to inform anxious relatives of victims.

``We're getting responses from all over the world,'' he told Reuters on Wednesday.

``For every appeal on the site, we get four or five truckloads of food,'' he added, saying it had also written to 22,000 organizations worldwide seeking aid.

Details of relief needs sought over the web are meticulous, with goods needed ranging from biscuits and milk powder to cotton rolls and analgesics.

Panjokutch.com has search boxes for village-wise information, 
organized alphabetically with date and time. People across the globe 
can seek or give details on victims and buildings. 



http://www0.mercurycenter.com/svtech/news/breaking/internet/docs/80146
8l.htm