The Gurkha Welfare Trust was established in 1969 to relieve poverty and distress among former Gurkha soldiers and their families in Nepal.
For nearly 50 years, its focus has been to provide financial and medical support for elderly Gurkha veterans and widows who rely on the Trust for a secure old age. For those who are unable to live independently, it offers residential care.
The Trust also delivers community aid to rural villages in Nepal, installing clean water and sanitation systems, building schools and running mobile medical camps.
However, in 2015 – the year in which Gurkhas mark their 200th anniversary of service in the British Army – the charity has been embroiled in a disaster of tragic proportions.
The series of earthquakes that began in April this year devastated the Gurkha homeland. Over 30,000 people were killed or injured while millions were displaced. The ex-Gurkha community did not escape the calamity, with over 2,100 of their homes damaged or destroyed. 13 veterans and widows lost their lives.
With support from serving Gurkha soldiers despatched to Nepal, the Trust responded immediately to provide medical care and distribute emergency supplies such as food, utensils and shelter in isolated rural areas where aid was otherwise slow to arrive.
One earthquake victim to receive the Trust’s help was Rifleman Shersing Gurung, a veteran of the Second World War whose wife sadly passed away last year. Since then, he has lived with his daughter’s family in Gorkha district, in the Himalayan foothills.
Shersing was enlisted in October 1940 and fought as a Bren-gunner against the notorious Japanese forces in Burma. He recalls: “The war was very tough. We’d often fight for many days with an empty stomach, surviving on two pieces of biscuit.”
After demobilisation, he returned to his remote home village of Milim and a peaceful but unforgiving life of subsistence farming. For a fit adult, it takes two hours of trekking and four hours by vehicle along a seasonal dirt track to get to the Trust’s nearest Welfare Centre in Gorkha town.
When the first earthquake struck on 25th April, Shersing was resting under the midday sun outside his home. He woke to find the ground shaking and heard walls collapsing around him but, now an old man of 97 years, he couldn’t find the strength to move. Fortunately his daughter arrived in time to drag him to safety and he survived.
When the Trust’s patrol team visited him a few days later he was staying in a cattle shed; his home had been almost completely flattened. Shersing even remembers the last great quake of 1934 but assures us that this tremor was far more intense. “When I was a soldier I wasn’t afraid of dying, but this earthquake was terrifying.”
The Trust’s mobile doctor checked his health condition and gave him necessary medication for his osteoarthritis; the previous prescription is still lost under several tons of rubble. He was also given emergency relief aid in the form of of cash, tarpaulins and food.
Shersing is now in a temporary shelter with his daughter and son-in-law, close to the ruins of his home. His family is alive but he worries for their future. The assistance he receives from the Trust is more crucial now than ever before. Without it, he would have nothing.
The monsoon rains have thus far prevented any long-term reconstruction work. However, one of the Trust’s priorities will be ensuring that veterans like Shersing have a safe, earthquake-resistant home in which to live.
The Trust’s wider response will range from the rebuilding of damaged schools and water projects to enhanced health care, in particular the ability to reach out into the furthest corners of the country and treat people in their secluded village homes.
Colonel William Shuttlewood OBE, Director of The Gurkha Welfare Trust, sums up its current ethos: “The Trust has an abiding commitment to Nepal, our home. We will do all that we can to support Gurkha veterans, their families and communities as they look to rebuild their lives following this unthinkable tragedy.”
The Trust is a registered charity (No. 1103669) that relies on the generosity of the public to support its welfare and relief work. To help them, please visit gwt.org.uk/donate/earthquake.
