The earthquake that hit the northern areas of Pakistan on the morning of October 8, 2005 was the most devastating natural calamity in the history of Pakistan. Confirmed official estimates of loss of life and damage to infrastructure put the death toll at over 77,000, the number of people rendered homeless at approximately 2.8 million, and the total cost of reconstruction at US$ 5 to 6 billion.

While these figures of losses and destruction are in themselves monumental, one of the most tragic aspects of this disaster is that roughly half of the fatalities were children, trapped under the debris of their schools. Hundreds of such schools in the affected areas were reduced to rubble, and as newspaper headlines screamed over the next few days, a whole generation was lost in a matter of seconds.