This city we once knew

What should we call a city where prolonged loadshedding of gas and electricity is a norm; where street crime has become a never-ending saga; where lack of public transportation keeps people isolated in several residential blocs; and where life is at its worst? An unlivable city? Pakistan’s only metropolis, Karachi, wears the crown of being the least liveable city in the world. In recent rankings released by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), which ranked 173 cities on multiple factors, including healthcare, education, culture, and infrastructure, Karachi is among the five least livable cities. This ranking is not a shocker as the city has been rather reluctant to let any other city take away this title. Living in Karachi has become a soul-crushing experience for almost all classes. While the elite are protected against the city’s financial woes, they remain vulnerable to a dismal law-and-order situation. For poor and low-income households, challenges like dwindling job opportunities; lack of affordable housing; the takeover of the private sector of key areas like health and education; water and gas shortages; and never-ending loadshedding have become hard to tackle. On top of it, the city has lost almost all of its green cover and become a concrete jungle.

City authorities continue to ignore the plight of residents and blame them for the state they are in, and citizens are shamed for lack of civic habits for the city’s woes, conveniently ignoring that Karachi needs a new Master Plan that could accommodate its rising population. Residential neighbourhoods, which once used to be lined with single-family homes, have turned into multi-storey buildings, often with poor facilities and other equipment. This has been done to make up for the ever-increasing housing demand and as a solution to government inaction. This improper planning, however, has caused huge dents in the city’s already scarce infrastructure.

Urban cities in the rest of the country, although with their own set of challenges, are relatively better. In Karachi, the situation has been like this for years. Much of this has also to do with the lack of political activities. Karachi also does not have impassioned candidates interested in governing the city. The JI’s fight against the ruling party PPP remains weak due to the latter’s dwindling support in the city. What rulers have done to Karachi is a tragedy. A city that once was a much-celebrated centre of industrialization and the arts and culture has now turned into ruins. The question is not whether the PPP and other parties in the power-sharing mix will take corrective measures to resolve the situation but for how long all stakeholders will continue to abandon the country’s metropolis.