• In Faisalabad, Pakistan, Rana Shaukat Ali today laid to rest the remains of his five children who died in the Samjhauta Express blast. Following reports that one of his daughters had survived and made it to Pakistan, his relatives spent an entire day frantically searching the city but their hopes were dashed when Shaukat Ali reached home with the bodies.

Mohammad Bilal, Hamza, Asma, Rehman and Ayesha, the eldest, a 15-year-old, were brought from Panipat by Shaukat Ali, accompanied by his wife Rukhsana and one-year old daughter Aqsa, the only survivors from the family.

“We got to hear that Ayesha had somehow made it from the train and had reached Lahore. Our entire family turned the city over looking for her,” Rana Shabbir Ahmed, Shaukat Ali’s brother, told The Sunday Express over phone from Faisalabad this evening. “But when Shaukat turned up with the children’s bodies and we saw her bangles and other ornaments, we were sure that she had died,” he added. “If she had survived, being an educated intelligent girl, would she not have found her way back to us, instead of wandering around?"