A TEAM of charity workers from East Lancashire is to visit Gujarat on a mercy mission to help earthquake survivors.

And Ahmed Suleman Sidat, chairman of the Lancashire Council of Mosques and one of the people behind a Lancashire Evening Telegraph-backed campaign, gave the trip his support.

It is thought more than 30,000 people were killed when the earthquake, measuring 7.7 on the Richter scale, struck on January 26, although that figure could rise as workmen discover more bodies under rubble.

At the weekend 400 bodies and a heap of gold coins were found in the district of Bhuj and Kutch, near to the epicentre of the quake.

The team of East Lancashire volunteers, proposed to be five-strong, are members of the Muslim Global Relief, a registered charity based in Nelson. Through local and national appeals, including a plea on Pakistan Television, in London, the charity has raised £50,000. Volunteers will visit villages, where they intend to give financial, medical and food aid to the thousands left homeless.

More than two weeks after the initial disaster, tremors are still being felt and thousands of people are still spending cold nights in the open because they fear more buildings will collapse. More than 30,000 tents have been issued to families and the Indian government estimates a further 125,000 are required.

Mohammed Ashfaq, secretary of Muslim Global Relief, said volunteers would help to erect camps for the surviving families.

He said: "We are taking a container of clothes and blankets with us and we have already bought tents from suppliers in India because it is three times cheaper than buying them here. We consider it our international responsibility to respond."

Imtiaz Patel, of Blackburn, added: "You see it in the newspapers and on television but people who have been say it is much worse than that. The earthquake, which I call the Deathquake, has taken the livelihood of thousands of people and entire communities have been destroyed. It is our moral, spiritual and international duty to offer whatever we can and we have already established our contact with our branch in Ahmadabad and another Indian charity, with whom we will be working."

The team is to visit Valsad, Surat and Bharouch, the three towns from which an estimated 99 per cent of Blackburn's Indian population hails.

The earthquake disaster appeal, supported by the Evening Telegraph, stands at around £13,000, but a series of fund-raising events in the pipeline should boost that.

Ahmed Sidat said: "We will be discussing how we can raise more money and I am pleased that the Muslim Global Relief charity has raised so much. We are all working together."

HOW TO HELP

IF you would to contribute to the earthquake disaster appeal, you can send donations directly to an appeal account at the NatWest bank, sort code: 01 00 85, account number:

14 01 05 93.