One hundred deaths later

Last Monday (November 11) robbers claimed the life of yet another innocent person in Karachi, bringing the overall toll of Karachi residents who have lost their lives in such incidents to 100. The victim in this case worked at a factory in the SITE Area, and was a father of three. Almost as if in response to the death toll reaching the century mark, a few days later, the Sindh High Court directed the Sindh’s inspector general of police to curb politicisation of the police department and ensure emancipation of the police from political hierarchy. The court also observed that law enforcement is hindered due to insufficient force deployment and improper recruitment, and that the Special Security Unit (SSU) force, which was initially intended for public safety, is currently used primarily for VVIP security. It is heartening to see that someone at least is taking notice of the deplorable law and order situation in the country’s business capital and calling out the shortcomings of those responsible for protecting its people’s lives and property. That being said, courts and other authorities have made similar observations about Karachi’s policing situation in the past and this has never resulted in any meaningful improvements in the city’s police.

While crime and lawlessness in Karachi are far lower than they were a decade ago, this is more so a result of the Rangers operations and changes in the city’s political environment. However, there is more to the armed robbers preying on the people of Karachi with relative impunity than just inadequate policing. One can argue that the police have never really been given the resources they need to do their jobs well. So while the SHC is right in asking the Sindh police to improve how it recruits, trains and deploys its officers and to better monitor their performance, we must also realise that none of this can be done for free. Does Pakistan really invest enough in the people’s first line of defence from crime and terror to get the kind of results it is asking them to deliver? This is something that can be said about the police across Pakistan. The consequences of this problem simply manifest with greater intensity in a city like Karachi given the greater opportunities for crime in a large urban environment. The socioeconomic disparities that define Pakistan also manifest themselves most strongly in such environments and combine with inadequate policing to make high crime a systemic problem.

Improving things will require more than simply chastising one law-enforcement institution to get its act together. Other institutions need to cooperate on things like the flow of illegal firearms, diverting young men away from a life of crime, creating more economic opportunity and access to education and making sure that the large socioeconomically deprived areas of Karachi have access to basic amenities. Right now, the city is composed of isles of relative affluence surrounded by oceans of informal housing or slums where people struggle to simply put food on the table every day. This is the kind of scenario in which even the best-trained and most well-equipped police force would struggle to keep people safe. And one cannot talk about crime and Karachi, or really crime anywhere in urban Pakistan, without taking into account the relative political isolation and powerlessness of the country’s urban polities. The empowerment of local governance is perhaps the main unfulfilled promise of the 18th Amendment and would likely go a long way towards building a more accountable police force and one that is more responsive to local needs.