Ahmedabad, Jan. 26 -- On the morning of January 26, 2001, Gujarat was stuck by a powerful earthquake that changed the course of life for hundreds of thousands of people. A magnitude 7.7 tremor struck near Chaubari village in Kutch district, about 250 km west of Ahmedabad, leaving a trail of destruction in its wake. The human toll was staggering: 13,805 dead, 167,000 injured, and 600,000 displaced. Kutch was the worst affected, accounting for 12,221 deaths, nearly 88% of the total toll. Beyond the numbers, entire communities were left to pick up the pieces of a life shattered, as the state scrambled to respond to a disaster of unprecedented scale. Twenty-five years on, the earthquake lingers in the stories of survival and loss, and in the le...