Bhuj Earthquake

On 26^th January 2001, a massive earthquake occurred near the town of Bhuj in Gujarat, on the border of Pakistan, which was named as Bhuj Earthquake. This town was located in the northwestern part of India near Pakistan. On that day, the entire Bhuj town was struck with India’s annual republic day celebrations. At that time, the Bhuj earthquake magnitude was about 7.7, which is 6.9 on the Richter scale. The Bhuj earthquake of 2001 destroyed the houses and properties of millions of people and killed about 25000 people. Also, a large majority of the local crops were destroyed. As a result, many people shifted their shelters to various places. This article describes the impact, reconstruction and international response to Gujarat Bhuj Earthquake explained here in detail. 

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Geographical Location of Bhuj

Gujarat was located between the Eurasian Plate and the Indian plate. And the town of Bhuj was located 300 to 400 km away from the plate boundary. The 2001 earthquake has mainly occurred due to the effects of the continuing continental collision along this boundary. While Gondwana in the Jurassic was broken up, Bhuj was affected by rifting with a roughly west-east trend. During the collision of plates, the area has undergone shortening and is involved in the reactivation of the original rift faults. As a result, the new low-angle thrust faults were developed. Also, the many other buildings were formed at a series of ranges near the central Kutch. 

The force of earthquakes will reverse faulting by reactivated rift faults. In 1819, the Rann of Kutch earthquake had a pattern of uplift and subsidence with reactivation. The 2001 Gujarat earthquake was mainly caused by the movement of an unknown south-dipping fault. This fault was parallel to the inferred rift structures

Effect of Gujarat Bhuj Earthquake 

As per the records, the total death recorded in the Kutch region was about 12300. The Bhuj was the town of Gujarat, which was located twenty kilometers away from the epicenter and it faced huge devastation during the Gujarat earthquake. This earthquake also created considerable damage in the Bhachau and Anjar regions. Hundreds of villages around the Taluka of Anjar, Bhuj, and Bhachau became flattened. 

Due to this earthquake, more than one million structures were damaged or destroyed, which includes historic buildings and tourist spots. This earthquake destroyed more than forty percent of homes, two hospitals, and eight schools around the Bhuj region. The Bhuj earthquake in 2001 destroyed historic monuments like the Swaminarayan temple, Prag Mahal and Aina Mahal. While the Indian National Trust for Arts and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) inspected more than 250 heritage buildings around the Kutch and Saurashtra region, they found that about  40% of the buildings were collapsed or in severely damaged condition. Also, only 10% of the monuments remained undamaged.  

Gujarat's commercial capital, Ahmedabad initially had a 7 million population, but several hundred people were killed in the Gujarat earthquake. Also, 50 multi-story buildings collapsed. From Gujarat's commercial capital, Ahmedabad the total property damage was estimated at around  $7.5 billion.  Due to this earthquake, 60% of the food and water supplies of people from Kutch were destroyed. Also, it destroyed around 258,000 houses, 90% of the district's housing stock. Bhuj civil hospital was totally demolished during the Bhuj earthquake region. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Society have raised a hand to support people affected by the earthquake through the Indian military.  A temporary Red Cross hospital was set up around the Bhuj region to take care of people affected by the Bhuj region. 

Reconstruction of the Bhuj Region 

After four months, the government of Gujarat announced the Gujarat Earthquake Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Policy to help people affected by the earthquake. The estimated cost for rebuilding the urban and rural construction was about US$1.77 billion. Through this policy, the government took different approaches to reconstructing the city. 

The main objective behind the development of policies includes repairing, building, and strengthening houses and public buildings. They also concentrated on health support, the revival of the economy, and reconstruction of the community and social infrastructure

Reconstruction of Houses 

The government took initiative in the removal of rubble and to set up temporary shelters for millions of people. The housing policies also concentrated on the full reconstruction of damaged houses and the retrofitting of undamaged units. Also, the government has introduced various policies to establish a community-driven housing recovery process. The government also gave the option for the communities affected by the earthquake to partially relocate to the in-situ reconstruction. Under this policy, the government has taken about 929,682 houses for repair and 213,685 houses for reconstruction. At the end of 2003, about 94% of houses were repaired and 53% of houses were reconstructed.  

Government’s City Plan

To construct a new city, the Environmental Planning Collaborative (EPC) was commissioned for support.  They mainly focused on creating a wide roadway network for providing emergency access to the city. The EPC also utilized the land readjustment for developing the eight town planning schemes.  This method helped them to reduce private land usage and to create adequate public land for widening the roadways. Through this method, the EPC readjusted the land and returned back the land to the original owners as final plots. 

International Response to Gujarat Earthquake 

While Gujarat faced massive damage due to the Bhuj earthquake. Many countries from various parts of the world raised their hands to help the affected people in different ways. The below table listed the name of countries and the relief offered by them in detail. 

This article described the geographical location of Bhuj, the impact, initiatives of the government with the international response of different countries in detail.