“I will never forgive the people who have done this to me,” were the words of the 12-year old tribal boy who lost his legs in a terrorist attack in Sadda town of Kurram Agency on July 25 last year.
Recollecting the incident on Tuesday, the wheelchair-bound Irfanullah Jan narrated his ordeal after suffering injuries in a bomb blast in Sadda in the volatile tribal region.
A resident of Pir Qayyum village in the lower Kurram Agency, Irfanullah said he was a Class-IV student at the Welcome Public School in Sadda where he used to get distinction in examinations. He said on the fateful day he was in the bazaar along with his uncle who was a noted journalist in the area.
“When we reached the market, my uncle’s friend running a grocery shop invited us for a cup of tea. They were talking when all of a sudden there was a blast outside the shop,” Irfanullah recalled.
He said all of them sustained injuries and when he opened his eyes after regaining consciousness at a hospital in Hangu, the Medicines Sans Frontier (MSF) doctors had operated upon him. Keeping his composure as he controlled his tears, he remarked: “The MSF doctors saved my life but could not save my legs from amputation.”
Irfanullah felt he would not have lost his legs if doctors were available at the local hospital in Sadda.Complaining against the political agent of Kurram Agency, he said: “The official must be changed because he could not save innocent children from killing and maiming. He didn’t meet us. He never visited my family or offered compensation that could have helped me with my medical treatment.”
When asked about studies, he said despite the traumatic experience he passed his 4th class annual examination securing 510 out of 600 marks a month ago and then appeared in the entry test of the Islamia Collegiate School Peshawar.
Determined to become a doctor to heal the sick and the wounded, Irfanullah Jan said he had been cherishing two wishes after partially recovering recently.
“I wish the government helped me in my education and provided me the German-made artificial limbs costing Rs0.7 million in Pakistan to enable me to stand up on my feet,” he said. “I feel so sad when I see my seven siblings and other children skipping and jumping during games,” he added.
Irfanullah like other violence-affected victims is undergoing training for his artificial limbs being provided to him by the Pakistan Institute of Prosthetic and Orthopaedic Sciences (PIPOS) at Hayatabad in Peshawar.
Moving with agility in the corridors of PIPOS in the wheelchair provided to him by the same organization, he asked the perpetrators of the violence “not to kill or cripple others in bomb blasts.”
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