Ahmedabad businessman returns from quake-ravaged Turkey

AHMEDABAD: An Ahmedabad-based businessman, Rakesh Singh, who returned to the city with his family, recounted the devastating earthquake in Turkey, terming the scenes after the quake as "horrific and scary".
53-year-old Singh, who has textile business interests in Turkey, Indonesia and Thailand, said that he got up to drink a glass of water, "when the whole building began shaking like a pendulum".Singh was with his wife and son on the second floor of an apartment in Gaziantep city, which bore the brunt of the first quake which hit the region at 4.17am on February 6.
"I woke up to drink a glass of water and just then, the building started shaking violently. We rushed out without even waiting to take our phones. The weather outside was chilly with rain and snow falling. People were wailing and desperately looking for their loved ones," he recounted on Sunday.
Singh said that he later got his phone and passports of family members from the building and called his colleagues, who are also from different cities of Gujarat. "Thankfully they all were also safe," he said. Singh, who returned with his family to Ahmedabad on Saturday morning, said that the situation in turkey is still very grim with people having to wait for more than two days in queues for petrol.
Having business interests in Turkey, Singh visits Turkey often and spends about a month there. This time, he had taken his wife and son along, as it snows in that country at around this time of the year. Gaziantep is a major centre for carpet manufacturing and export, he said.