State funeral or Edhi's final humiliation?

Abdul Sattar Edhi is the only man who consistently stood up for the poor throughout the history of Pakistan. He didn’t shy away from burying the dead, no matter what their political, religious, or sectarian affiliation. He was the man, who didn’t put a cloth to his nose while carrying a putrefied body taken out of an open manhole. He was the true revolutionary in the face of the feudal-military-capitalist trio. And the same trio, that threatened him for his entire life and work, and for filling the gap left by the failed ideas of the multiple military and feudal dictatorships, humiliated him in death by hijacking his funeral and only making it about the corrupt and the puppets in the power corridor.

The ruling elite of this country is only good at one thing, and that is depriving the majority of their right to live with dignity. Today, they proved it further by not just depriving the poor masses, who loved Edhi sahib, of performing his last rights, but also by insulting Edhi sahib himself who was never on the side of the VVIP culture. 

Edhi sahib's funeral congregation at the National Stadium Karachi on July 9, 2016

The divide between the poor and rich was starkly pronounced on this tragedy.

Only men in uniform are visible in the front row at the funeral

The venue of the funeral was changed from Memon Masjid on MA Jinnah Road, a highly accessible area via most bus routes for all and sundry to the National Stadium amid ‘tight security’. The man who was threatened by the ISI’s notorious Hameed Gul and Taliban Khan, the man who travelled mostly in dilapidated Suzuki Bolan ambulances, the man who picked bodies amid deadly riots in Karachi and provided funerals for the unclaimed, was given a funeral by his tormentors. 

Women too were barred from Edhi sahib’s funeral, who prayed shoulder to shoulder with us, instead of the mullah prescribed step ahead.

Now there will be disclaimers and those who worship the armed forces will come out in defense of the hijacking. They will call it a well deserved state funeral and protocol. But to set the record straight, the protocol was not for Edhi sahib. It was for the ‘General’ and the ones responsible for every tragedy that befalls this country. It was for those people who left Edhi sahib no choice, but to continue being a philanthropist amongst greedy capitalists, and men with weapons and beards.

After all, the men in boots carried away our beloved Edhi the way Hameed Gul had threatened in 2011.

The potholes and the missing covers

I counted at least 4-5 open manholes between Nagan Chowrangi and Centrum on the main road the other day. The remaining 14 or so, and I am sure I missed many, were either too low below the surface that a car or the plenty of rickshaws on the road could fall in or too high that a new Mira could get its rear misaligned.

It was in one such manhole that a rickshaw fell in today. The driver and passenger both suffered minor injuries.

Immediately some bikers stopped to help the rickshaw driver with getting the front wheel out of the manhole so the traffic could continue smoothly. The expertise with which the matter was handled showed how often such accidents occur on the roads of this megalopolis of more than 20 million residents.

This reminded me of an incident in July last year when the rickshaw I was travelling in hit a pothole on Nishter Road and broke its front wheel. Luckily the rickshaw did not topple and the driver and I both survived with a few minor bruises. After the accident people just picked up the rickshaw and parked it on the roadside in front of the Caltex petrol pump.

At that time too I observed people simply went about their business as fast as the accident happened. Some even said ‘ye to yahan roz hota hai, ye garha bara khatarnak hai’ (this happens daily at this spot…this pothole is very dangerous).

And this is routine.

Those who travel on the streets of Karachi are no strangers to the ailments of this city. From open manholes to overflowing sewers, too many accidents to signal free corridors, and lack of public transport to the dangerous qingqi (chingchi) rickshaws, we’ve seen all.

With no public transit system one has no option but to avail the dilapidated buses, occasionally sighted green buses, qingqis or rickshaws – taxis are only available outside the emergency of public and private hospitals where they charge exorbitant amounts to transport patients. But these options become more dangerous with the horrible road conditions.

On January 5, 2016, just five days into the new year, Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah woke up to a campaign run by a Pakistan-Tehreek-e-Insaf supporter Alamgir Khan asking to fix the uncovered manholes of the biggest metropolitan city of Pakistan. The esteemed CM ordered the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) to #fixit. However, his directives held no sway over the KMC that has forever been complaining about lack of funds to even fuel their dumpers.

So, on February 25, 2016, Khan attempted to dump the garbage he collected in front of the CM House, for which he was arrested. Though the campaigner was later released, his idea of stencilling the CM’s head next to manholes garnered him a lot of support, maybe even respect.

This support was not because people just thought the CM’s head looks funny next to a gutter filled with filth, but because the public is genuinely unhappy about the road conditions. Perhaps unhappy is too small a word to convey the public annoyance over the lack of infrastructure maintenance.

Karachi has lived without a local government for close to eight years now. The roads and bridges that were so proudly laid out by Mustafa Kamal now lie in horrible conditions. Expansion joints on each bridge have separated and one can imagine what ox-cart rides in Khairpur and other dilapidated PPP constituencies must be like.

Potholes and broken roads are only being filled and carpeted where a new multi-story projects are under way. But the quality is so poor that the roads go bad faster than the time it took to get them fixed. The cherry on top is the the massive miscommunication among the public departments. They consistently forget to do all their works while a road lies dug up, messing up the routines of commuters and pedestrians again and again.

If things remain the same, it won't be long before the Sindh CM's face becomes a regular feature next to all uncovered manholes.

Jamaat-ud-Dawa loves Pakistan army

This year in January, I wrote about Charlie Hebdo and then I stopped. I stopped because I felt unsafe. I thought of removing my writings from my personal blog because this country, where I chose to live, has no respect for me as a human, let alone as a free-thinking, outspoken, working woman. I did not blog for a long time. Not because there was nothing to write, but because I felt exhausted with dissent.

Is there any good left in Pakistan, I often ask myself, and before I find an answer, something bad happens ---again. In Pakistan, bad is on loop. You get done with the death anniversary of someone or some incident every month, and a new tragedy is added to the mourning list.

Last week on April 24, 2015, we lost T2F founder-director Sabeen Mahmud, who was allegedly shot by 'unidentified' assailants. Her crime, they say, is her involvement or show of solidarity with the Baloch, especially Mama Qadeer, who spoke about the missing persons of Balochistan at the T2F. It has been four days since Sabeen's murder. She has been buried and will probably be forgotten by the time the next tragedy hits us, but do we remember what we were doing in April last year after Hamid Mir was also allegedly shot by the ISI on April 19, 2014?

MQM-H protesting against Geo in front of 
the Jang Press at I.I. Chundrigar Road.

We were, as usual, divided in two groups. One who refused to accept that Hamid was shot by the intelligence agencies, and the other, who alleged that the only people to attack the journalist were the farishtas. Last year, on April 28, 2014, there were countrywide protests by Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC), Mohajir Qaumi Movement-Haqiqi (MQM-H), Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat (ASWJ), Anjuman Naujawanan-e-Islam, Pakistan Forces Lovers Forum, Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT), and countless other groups, some even from Kashmir, against Geo TV and Hamid Mir. Their clout? One cannot accuse a Pakistani intelligence agency of shooting someone.

The protesters refused to accept that the security agencies of Pakistan could be rogue or even have any rogue elements operating covertly. Their slogan? "We love Pakistan Army: Jamaat-ud-Dawa". We can guess the rest. A humble letter accompanying a metal pellet.

Last year's tags: Christianity, feminism, Islam, men, Pakistan, patriarchy, religion, temptation, women, academics, Army, colonialism, elitism, feudalism, generals, imperialism, India, military, archaeology, architecture, bye-laws, culture, heritage, Moenjodaro, Pink Floyd, Pink Floyd in Pompeii, PPP, Sindh, Sindh Festival, UNESCO, injustice, leftists, liberals, rights, secular, workers, Karachi, Parachinar, Quetta, Shia, Sunni, takfiri, Deobandi, Balochistan, British, Kashmir, nationalism, separatists, colonizers, English speaking, sub-continent, academia, employ-ability, employment, higher education, jobs

Takfir, recipe for ‘Halal’ genocide

We live in a cauldron of sectarian strife. Where Deobandis consider Shias, Ahmedis and Barelvis dispensable, Salafis consider every one disposable, Shias and Sunnis feel Ahmedis should be put to the sword. All in all, most of the mainstream sects have a hint of Takfiri, a dash of fanatic and a sprinkling of Tableeghi in them. And yet, there has been no mention of the treatment meted out to the non-Muslim minorities yet. Those dishes, err! People are not allowed in the kitchen called Pakistan. Or we use the whole set of chefs’ knives we bought using CIA funding.

Apart from Jhang, Karachi and other pantries of Pakistan, our crooks have been trained in Kashmir, against the vegetarian chefs; and Afghanistan, against the radical chefs from Russia. Remember the 80s? We had a famous General Crook working with the CIA? He’s the one who bought the knives. In short, our cookhouse is more of a madhouse. And these were just the chefs, we haven’t even mentioned our in-house official butchers yet. It’s a dangerous business, cooking. We cannot be hypocrites and claim we ensure safety and security, and that too peacefully for anybody, let alone the rare dishes.

The chefs, at least the ones trying to maintain a certain taste, want the Arab cuisine to be the favorite, not just the favorite; it should actually be considered the most supreme among all, compared to which any rare or medium rare dish should not be given any importance. However, there is a major problem, we are not sticking to Arab food and the chefs that be don’t like it. The reason is that everyone has opened a TV channel to promote their own recipe and hence it gives them an edge. Chefs from the Tigris and Euphrates valley are being given more airtime, and the Persian chef is increasingly poisoning the cooking trends. Hence, we have decided to purge his minions using our master chefs’ LeJ (lovingly known as the Jhangvi) & SSP (fondly remembered as the Sipah-e-Sahaba).

Here are a few recipes from the online archives of the Haq Char Yaar website, a favorite with SSP and LeJ, yes yes these are some famous chefs known for their unsavory methods for purifying our cookhouse. Their craving for purity is the driving factor, even if it means burning and slaughtering the dishes. They compete with butchers, but that is a separate story. Let’s not botch it up for now.






Avoid them at all costs, on the roads and wherever else you go. And don’t be offended if they shoot you down, especially if you are a Persian chef and a Shia; bear in mind that even if you have tasted Persian food you might not be spared, totally your fault for not sticking to Arab food. If possible, keep your greasy kitchens locked, as nobody is willing to take a guarantee against them. The supporters of the Arab food don’t even consider the Persian cooks worthy rivals. Useless and dispensable the food as well as the ones who make it, is what the clear message is. So read it carefully.

Not to be left behind in technology, many of these dangerous chefs are tweeples now. They know only good recipes are not enough to take down the foreign imposters, so they now use social media for voicing their frustration. They have quite a following too, more than 2000 followers and some blood curdling tweets, giving a step by step methodology to flush out the unwanted. They might even put our butchers to shame. Follow them for some good cleaving and beheading techniques if you are a butcher.






Our cookhouse, the madhouse, brewing war to spread all over the world to appease the oil giants and their consumers is in a sad shape. Be it Gilgit, Quetta, Parachinar, Lahore, Karachi, Hyderabad, the poison is spreading with no end in sight. For how long till it boils over and burns each and everything is anybody’s guess. One thing is sure though, none of our safety gear is in place and the inspectors aren’t interested in even checking the fire extinguishers. Till then, butchers roam freely in this land of pure!

Lynch mob mentality can get anybody killed

The three men marked in red are the main aggressors

A regular day on the streets of Karachi…

An unfortunate man was beaten by a mob of 100 people in front of North Nazimabad Board Office Park. The man was accused of trying to snatch a mobile and money from a man at gunpoint. The incident sheds light on not only the ‘lynch mob culture’ prevalent in Pakistan – Sialkot incident – but also the utter failure of law enforcers.

While the situation kept escalating and the victim started bleeding, two Rangers who were busy snap checking motorcyclists disappeared. Later two policemen on a motorcycle arrived at the scene, only to leave within a few minutes, without even attempting to disperse the violent crowd.

There were at least 4 or 5 rickshaws present around the crowd and several motorcycles. I was shoved around by the crowd and told to go away, as it is not a place for women. It seemed it was a free for all, since whoever stopped, gave the man a few slaps and kicks. The victim kept yelling he had done nothing wrong and can be checked there is not phone or gun on him.

Whoever stopped and got a chance to get near, beat him

On questioning the aggressor, I was informed that the man stole a mobile phone at gunpoint, however, when he was asked to produce the mobile and pistol the victim carried, the aggressor had nothing to say. On being told they had no right to beat the man the aggressors started screaming, refusing to call police and said that law enforcers are useless in curbing crime, “we have no choice but to take law in our own hands”. Police does nothing but let culprits roam around free. They also intimidated the Daily Times driver and asked him to go away.

The aggressor kept changing his statement; first he said that the man was stealing mobiles in the bus. Another guy intervened at that moment and said that they were both travelling in the rickshaw, not the bus. So the aggressor changed his statement and said he was in the rickshaw with his wife and brother. A call was made to 15 to ask for police assistance, who did not arrive for the next 15 minutes, during which time some other men took the victim across the road, while the original aggressors stayed around me intimidating me with screaming and loud explanations. Told the guy wearing blue shalwar kameez to stop shouting, and they still had no right to beat the man so brutally.

Asked the aggressor to show his ID card, but he refused and sat in the rickshaw, while a guy in khaki t-shirt asked us to leave, as the man has been allowed to 'go'. Someone had even threatened to immolate him. DT driver was shoved around again to leave the scene.

The crowd by that time had thinned and dispersed. Later, SSP Amir Farooqi was called for details in this regard, who gave a totally different version of the incident. According to the SSP, “The victim was beaten up because of eve-teasing.” On a question he said that a police mobile reached the spot after some time, however the crowd had already dispersed. He confirmed that the man is safe and was not burnt alive by the mob.

I have been told by several people that putting myself in danger was not a good idea. That the man might have been a thief and perhaps this is the only way to get rid of the menace of mobile snatchers. Here is why I disagree, let us revisit August 15, 2010, when Mughees, 15, and Muneeb Butt, 17, alleged mobile snatchers, were beaten to death in front of a crowd which included members of the district police. They were proved innocent in the court, posthumously.

In another case, an angry mob burnt two robbers alive in Karachi, on May 15, 2008. Yet another case is of a man burnt alive in Dadu for desecrating the Quran on December 23, 2012. Youtube has many videos of Shia men being dragged behind motorcycles and immolated by extremists in certain parts of Punjab.

The problem in vigilante 'justice' is, often it is too late to prove the truth of the matter. Here are a few reasons that could have been used, or are often used to incite a mob in Pakistan:

• The victim is a relative and the men beating him up owed him money.
• A sister or any woman family member was in love with the guy.
• He was a thief but had 'somehow' manage to get rid of the evidence.
• It was only frustrated public taking out their anger at a poor man.

Date and time of incident: June 3, 2013, between 5:30pm and 5:45pm

Cesspool of humanity

You can support Imran Khan, Altaf Hussain, Shehbaz Sharif, Obama, Romney, Bal Thackery, Ahmadinejad or whoever else we have available from the concentrated gene-pool or cesspool of humanity, I don't care. But do not lose your humanity in your 'support for these genetically stunted creatures'. Do not on one hand be anti-drone and on the other hail army operations in other parts of the world. Do not say you are a human rights supporter if you think that giving capital punishment is justified. Do not be aggressive against other beliefs, killing them, maiming them and rendering them clueless as to what hit them, and then hold the non-believer responsible for being aggressive towards you visually, virtually or graphically.

Supporting political or religious ideologies beyond humanity is nothing to be proud of. Killing to wipe the 'other' off the face of this earth is nothing short of a genocide. Perhaps the evo-psychologist would love to say this is genetic and that this is the exact gene responsible for wiping out the Neanderthals 30,000 years ago.

Oh and please do not say if it wasn't for the boob-baring women, there would be no earthquakes or genocides. For otherwise your house should be in a quake every time someone took a shower at home, especially if that someone was a woman. Or you would be taking baths in your own relatives blood. Spare me your shenanigans on how depraved modern society is when it comes to teen pregnancy and sexual orientation, for even baboons have better understanding then that. And if you think I will be impressed about your knowledge on Gaza and the Iron Dome, or even how infowars has clarified Osama's death which took place eight years ago, let me be absolutely rude here, I don't give a fuck!

Violence is not the answer. Not in any form. Be it from organized military, or from the 'extremists' against the innocent. Resistance does not mean violence. Need of the day is not to sit in your drawing room asking what would become of this world while sipping chilled pepsi, beer, vodka whichever you prefer, but that you move your bum and get to work.

You ask me when will it end? I say, when instead of asking 'when will it end' you are on the streets, next to me, fighting to make it end.

Rain

The smell of earth,
Drenched with droplets,
Liquid bliss for the parched land,
As sheets of water,
Falling from the sky,
Cleanse dirt, air and flight,
Dancing in rain,
Getting purer by the drop,
Come the rays of light,
Trying to catch the rainbow!

Using the Godfather way

People often question why the Muttahidda Qaumi Movement (MQM) has so much support in Karachi and not other parties. (And I'm not a supporter of any party - a disclaimer was necessary here) MQM was not always there, rather it was the mullah party and the feudal party who had Karachi in their clutches after the capital was shifted to Islamabad. The city was divided between the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) with some smaller parties until 1987 when MQM swept Karachi and Hyderabad in the local body elections. However, it did not happen overnight or because the Urdu speaking suddenly wanted to support MQM for its linguistic and ethnic origins.

There is a documentary about the Medici made by PBS. It describes how from being mere bankers the Medici gained support from the people. By doing favors. Or I guess it can even be called the Godfather way. They did favors for people regardless of their social standing and in return gained their loyalty.

This is what the MQM does in Karachi. They do things like getting the electricity bill fixed for Muhammad Liaquat, which was screwed by the KESC; or one of the sector boys takes care of the weekly grocery shopping of a few women in the 'mohalla'; and some goon beats up the guy who teased Farrukh's sister on the street. These things enabled the MQM to get more and more support from the public. Another reason they get more support is that they do not have feudal lords in the upper echelons of the party. Rather they have doctors, engineers etc.

To increase their support, finances and vote bank, the ANP desperately needs more land in Karachi. Why the ANP needs land? That is the only way they will be able to generate more funds and more votes for themselves to stay around, following the MQM lead on getting to the public directly. I remember my Pakhtun taxi driver who always said that although he is not in ANP directly, if anybody in his 'abadi' has a problem, they go to the local sector to get it fixed. Hence the land mafia of any particular party is a goodwill and recruiting office. Less land for any party means, less funds and less voters. The tragedy for ANP is, it came to Karachi at a point when most land is already occupied or built.

PPP on the other hand screwed up its vote bank, which was mostly in Lyari and the suburbs of Karachi. They failed the people by not doing enough and are now fighting tooth and nail to get it back. In all this mayhem, the only people silently going about their business, and getting more support, are the bloody mullahs. One gets to see an increasing number of zombies in black abayas and more and more men with pants above their ankles in Karachi.

If only the sparring parties would take this as a hint and stop indulging in the urban warfare, Karachi may still have hope.

The unaccounted girls?

Abductions of Urdu-speaking girls has been often claimed to happen during riots between the Pathan and Urdu-speaking community in Karachi. So far I mostly attributed it to being an extension of the old story about Gohar Ayub Khan picking ‘Muhajir’girls (since at that time the term Urdu-speaking was not coined) from Lalukhait in 1964, which resulted in the language riots. However, the frequency and intensity of these stories has increased, since Benazir’s assassination and the ensuing riots that engulfed Karachi. What further boggles the mind is that none of the major news agencies carry this information. From BBC to Express Tribune, Daily Times, Jang etc.

One reason could be that the stories are often only related by word of mouth and therefore can easily be considered rumors. If these are just rumors, they could be used to exploit the youth by the interest groups. If they are not rumors, it shows the tribal mentality still prevalent in our society where dishonoring women is just a part of an all out war, in which women do not even have a say. They are just a tool, used by the enemy to feel powerful and make the other party feel weak and dishonored. There could other factors too which must not be over looked, and that is some traditional Pathans buy a woman to get married. This could be a perfect opportunity for them to get a wife at no cost nevertheless this could not be the only reason for them to indulge in this activity.

Another question to ask could be why are the parents’ not reporting if this is happening? I suppose there are many reasons for that too; Shame, dishonor, fear of being ostracized, illegal resident status (in case of Bangladeshi families) and the 'ghairat' syndrome, which has more value than a woman herself. Combine everything together and we have unreported rapes, molestations, and abductions etc of women. Although many people may disagree since politically moticated issues always get highlighted by the media, citing the case of Mukhtara Mai and Shazia Marri, can anybody honestly feel that these are the only two political rape/abduction cases in Pakistan against women? These may be the two most reported cases, but not the only ones. The media needs to verify these stories or to put the rumors at rest so that the negative elements do not use it to further escalate the already deteriorated conditions in the city.

The incidents
The first such story was related in February 2008 by an old Baloch woman resident of Lyari. She was concerned about the moral deprivation of the youth and said, “I am shocked how they can steal from the same guy who provided them with food at no cost when they did not have any money. Not only that, they even picked girls from their houses.” What she said could be an exaggeration, one may never find out.

Another incident was reported by some relatives, a husband and wife, who were passing through SITE Industrial Area and witnessed the abduction of three women factory workers by some men in a Suzuki pickup. Their guess was they were Baloch and Makrani men.

Now this is July 2011 and the same kinds of stories are pouring in from Katti Pahari and Qasba Colony, Orangi Town. According to our Dhobi, he witnessed a stranded bus from which some Pathan men picked up the Urdu-speaking girls and the rest of their mob beat up whoever tried to resist or save them. The police standing nearby merely watched, since they probably had no orders to act. While some other men too witnessed similar incidents in the area, there is still a blackout in the news about these incidents. There is not even a report putting to rest such rumors.

Whether these stories are true or not, they remind one of the gory pre-partition stories written by Saadat Hassan Manto.

Katchi Abadi regularisation short term solution

Karachi being the biggest city of Pakistan currently has around 18 million residents as per unofficial statistics and still increasing as there is no check on the number of immigrants each year. From 6 million immigrants who came to Pakistan in 1947, 2 million Afghan refugees, illegal Bangladeshis and Biharis who came after the fall of Dhaka and millions of local immigrants from rural or less developed areas, the city is suffering from a severe shortage of proper or legal housing facilities, and around 50% dwell in slums or squatter settlements.

Distinguishing between the types of katchi abadies would be important here, as there is not just a single type. These abadies can broadly be divided into two categories; the old totally unplanned abadies that were established at the time of the Indo-Pak partition and the ones that came into existence because land-grabbers mobilised and provided houses to the constantly rising number of immigrants, especially with a boom in the Industries. After partition the government was not equipped to deal with the immigrants and hence and therefore people on self help basis provided themselves with whatever they could muster. However, instead addressing the issue, the government continued to neglect this sector and also neither checked the rapid rural to urban migration nor provided enough housing facilities. Thus, government negligence towards this factor, combined with the land-grabbers has not helped much, as land-grabbers taking advantage continuously kept on the move, grabbing more and more government land turning it to slums/katchi abadies.

The desperate immigrants on the other hand, who come looking for a place to live, find these katchi abadies to be the best solution for them. They are comparatively cheap, and more importantly can be found close to wherever they work and that too without paperwork. At places the encroached houses would be almost cantilevered above the Lyari River, with their foundations sunk deep in the sewage water, but this does not deter someone set on making it work no matter what the circumstances.

The situation instead of getting better has worsened as the government being merely disinterested in addressing the root cause, regularised these settlements, giving more incentive to the land-grabbers. If this regularisation process had just been followed by the provision of sufficient low-income houses as well as a check on rural to urban migration, perhaps it would have been better, but since it was not so, encroachments continued.

Moreover, involvement of political parties like MQM and PPP did not help much either, who instead of finding a true solution wanted to keep the people in the same conditions for either appeasing them to retain their vote banks or to keep them deprived of a better infrastructure and environment.

According to the Orangi Pilot Projects survey, conducted in 2002, the total number of katchi abadies was 539, whereas a news report dated June 27, 2010 claims, “There are around 1,293 spatial settlements, out of which the Sindh Katchi Abadi Authority has regularised only 500, while the remaining are being processed for regularisation.”

As a nation it appears we have a penchant for short term answers. We accept the government’s shortcomings and give it leeway to implement such short sighted solutions. There are several reasons for referring to the regularisation of katchi abadies as short term, foremost being that these katchi abadies are hubs for several illegal activities, starting from smuggling of something as mundane as cloth to drugs and ammunition. The abadies are nurseries for most criminal gangs and activities, since hiding in the criss-crossed lanes is not difficult. Also worth mentioning are the terrorists, who were arrested from several katchi abadies over the past few months, despite that in certain areas even law-enforcement agencies fear to go, or are supposedly scared to go.

Other causes to oppose katchi abadi regularisation include lack of planning and building regulations. Since a lot of the poor settlements are unplanned, often there is no provision for modern vehicles to pass through, which gives rise to the question what would happen in case the government has to provide aid to the local residents. These settlements are bustling with three, four and even six storey buildings, poor construction and bad planning with hardly any space between the lanes for a big car let alone a truck to pass through. In such circumstances even if a fire breaks out, the fire tenders have a tough time reaching the inferno.

With such conditions prevalent, we have a disaster looming round the corner, which may strike us any day. It may look fine and noble at the first glance to regularise the slums, filled with criminal activities, combined with bad planning and bad construction, but in reality and long term it is not so. Hopefully, the government would realise this soon, as well as the supporters of the idea, who consider the word slum should be reserved for the West, as slums are considered physical and morally bankrupt, but our katchi abadies are only physically dilapidated and not socially decrepit. A farsighted approach is needed, and more houses of course.

Witnessing a robbery

The night before last I came home angry and furious at our apathy and helplessness in face of guns and death. On main MA Jinnah Road, a bastard robbed a man in his car. There were six motorcyclists around, our press van, another pickup, and this lunatic on a motorcycle, wearing a p-cap looking as if he had all the time in the world, yelling at the driver of the car to handover the mobile and cash. Nobody was able to do anything except be silent onlookers. It was a typical scene with one man on a motorcycle with a TT-pistol, having no inhibitions or fear, acting as if he owns everything, including the people.

When the man handed him the loot, he took a u-turn and sped away. Nobody reacted. It took me at least 3 seconds to even realise what actually was happening, while the whole thing just finished in 15 seconds. The pistol he held looked evil in the streetlights. The motorcycle riders looked nervous, and the children in the car looked excited as well as scared.

I have been unable to get the whole scene out of my head. I cannot stop thinking how we are raising children in this country. With gun-wielding lunatics running rampant, and all of us so scared to move even an inch in front of those weapons and the savages who carry them.

Perhaps, this was my first such experience and therefore am so concerned and moved, people around me just took it in their stride and told me it was something that happened every other day, and I better get used to it, and be more concerned about my own safety rather then thinking what I could have done for somebody else.

Anyway…..

Today, while coming home there was a police mobile standing at the spot where the robbery took place. Whether it was because the victim complained or some other reason, but I was wondering where that mobile had been previously. Perhaps wherever it had been, the criminals would find a green signal there and resume their activities, and meanwhile, let this section of MA Jinnah Road be crime free.

Cyclone threat, inefficient management

Thatta and Badin as well as the coastal belt of Karachi faced the cyclone and flash-flood threat. People were moved to temporary shelters and government buildings. Despite being closer to the urban areas, the authorities still failed to provide efficient facilities to the population.

According to news reports, most people refused to use the government’s tents and preferred staying with their relatives. One reason for this behaviour is the inadequacy of the concerned authorities and lack of foresight in such situations. It is always problematic to make people understand the need to move to a safer place, as they are attached to their homes and also fear for their belongings being stolen or ransacked even in a calamity. Moreover, past incidents have proven true such fears, where households have been ravaged by marauding mobs during or after a disaster.

Another reason people refuse are the deplorable conditions that are kept at any temporary camp site or government buildings. People who were living in proper houses are expected to live-in together in government buildings, while sharing everything communally and without any decent amount of privacy. These circumstances are discouraging for people with large families, especially if they have young daughters or sisters.

Under these circumstances it becomes necessary for the government to not only make the public aware of their safety, but also assure of reducing the losses to the minimum. In general there is also a need to provide respectable accommodations or even tents that give people privacy to a certain extent.

No-identity is Karachi’s architectural identity

The city of Karachi has no socio-economic, administrative or cultural identity of its own; therefore it has no personal architectural identity or language as well. It is a mixture of several languages as well as myriad individual characteristics that have been brought to this city with the colourful array of immigrants, whether foreign or local.

The architecture consists of different personal, public and private abodes ranging from ramshackle makeshift rag and mat huts, to the 1,000 sq yard mansions and the constantly mushrooming high-rise buildings, either in the commercial hub or in the suburbs, advertised as new luxury apartments.

However, one thing that remains persistent everywhere is, there is no such thing as consistency here. Buildings are designed, planned and executed in anyway the owner, contractor or an architect pleases. Volumes could be written about the styles and construction methodologies adopted here since there is not just one way to go about the business.

Buildings from the British Raj look strongly anchored to the ground with their limestone and sandstone facades or at times merely limestone claddings laid on top of a concrete layer - a significant feature downtown. Whereas on the other hand are the government quarters on Martin Road and Jehangir Road that have two large rooms with a covered veranda serving as a transition space from the rooms to the kitchen as well as the separate latrine and bath facilities situated in the courtyard. Although these quarters have changed a lot of shape, one must mention here the much larger quarters that used to grace Jacoblines, where there are the 40 sq yrd ghettos. with some atrocious high rise apartments, designed/proposed by the famous Yasmeen Lari in the ‘70s. The so-called low income houses are more of pigeonholes then residential quarters, with a minimum area of 40 sq yards per family. Nevertheless, apartments they are, monstrous or not.

There are also those concrete houses from the 40s and 50s that display at least one cylindrical element or room in the plan, giving way to the styles, where to cater to the large families and less space, there emerged blocks of houses to make housing a more available necessity. These houses use the maximum covered space and have several small inter-connected rooms within, mostly opening onto a narrow passageway within the house and windows facing the narrow lane at the back of the house, generally referred to as the ‘gandi galli’ owing to the accumulated garbage.

Houses and buildings from the ‘70s have a solid looking structure, with mostly horizontal elements defining separate planes, having been influenced by the American architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s Prairie Houses. These houses often have a chimney like wall, with stone cladding, that appears to be holding the rest of the structure together, although, mostly this wall is random and not a chimney at all. Perhaps this was the time when the local Architecture schools started having a market and henceforth the American influence increased.

Or it had to do with General Ayub’s friendship with Doxiadas, making people mimic a mixture of foreign architecture and architectural practices.

Moving on, although one must also mention amongst all these, the cheap copies of different buildings, which imitate from Greco-Roman to the Colonial Architecture. Nevertheless, copies they remain with their overtly over-done facades and badly executed arches, or the ‘sort-of’ Ionic or Doric Columns with a hint of the Corinthians.

All in all, the architecture of Karachi is a mixed palette, with either the unsung traditional architecture springing up here and there, or the overrated modern architecture with the ugly glass surfaces.