Poverty versus progress

Despite the various claims by ministers and the government that Pakistan is making progress in the economic sphere as well as other fields, a new report by the World Bank shows an increase in poverty in the country, raising it to 44.7 per cent. This figure from April 2025 exceeds the poverty rate of 39.8 per cent measured by the World Bank four years ago. Part of this is a result of revision by the World Bank of its figures regarding poverty. The poverty rate has been raised from the previous number of around $3 to $4.20 per person per day. Extreme poverty has been put at $2.15 to $3 in the country.

These figures are alarming. They indicate that nearly half the country lives in poverty and also that the gap between the poor and the rich continues to rise. The Gini Index puts this at 32 per cent. In other words, there are huge disparities and huge gaps between the very poor and the rich in the country. The elite capture, spoken about so often, has become apparent in a budget that raises the salary of government servants but ignores other sectors, and also states that the minimum wage is to be based on the consent of industrialists.

We all know it is a logical fact that industrialists will not favour any increase in this figure because they are not inclined to give more to their employees, no matter what their profit margins may be. This is apparent in most industries, including the press industry itself. It is also true of textiles, pharmaceuticals and almost every other field, with a few notable exceptions.

So how does this translate into real life for the people of Pakistan? Take the guard who stands outside a bank from morning till evening. He is aged over 60 and has grandchildren at home in his native Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. He told a visiting client that he would not be going home for Eid as no holiday had been granted. His pay is Rs16,000 for the month and this is often paid later in the month rather than the first day of every new calendar month.

There is a steep problem here. No one can survive in such circumstances and all of us who run households know that a pay of Rs16,000 is not enough to sustain even a small family.

There are many other stories. We hear of people feeding their children roti with just water. We hear that tea is favoured over wheat flour because it dampens hunger and is more affordable than roti. The calories in the tea -- from the sugar added -- give people some energy and enable them to work harder and harder for very little pay.

These realities are visible all around us from one day to the next. We see them in our own households, we see them on the streets, we see them at almost any place we visit and we see them in villages. The question is how to bridge the inequality and give people an equal chance in life.

The question is one of political will in the first place. In the past, questions have already been raised about why there are no hospitals in places like Layyah or Kamalia or other rural centres while roads continue to be built in Lahore, apparently in line with the vision of turning the unfortunate city into something resembling Paris or Dubai or perhaps some other city that most of the population of Lahore has never visited and will never see in person.

The trees being cut down for these developmental projects add to the extreme heatwave sweeping over the city and over other parts of the Punjab.

We need to begin a project where from the very early years our children, who represent the future generation, are made aware of the disparity and how it canbe overcome. Taxes are one key to this. This of course does not mean GST or other indirect taxes but taxation on landowning and agricultural land.

This has still to come. At present we depend on charity. The rate of charity from a mainly generous public is one of the highest in the world in Pakistan. But as we can see from the World Bank figures, it is not enough to lift people out of poverty and the terrible misery that comes with it.

The misery means people in some cases need to decide which of four children to keep in school and which to remove. For reasons we are all familiar with, girls are often picked to be taken out of the education system. In other households, people need to determine whether to pay the electricity bill or school fees. The choice is almost impossible. We talk about the resilience of people, but we should also be talking about the choice and how long they can continue to live as they do.

Of course, people should be rising up against the existing circumstances themselves. This includes not only those who live in poverty or extreme poverty and cannot spare the time and energy to agitate, but richer and better educated members of society who see what's happening all around them. We see some evidence of this awareness in new generations with pages on social media reflecting a desire to alter reality in the country. But things need to move fast if there is to be any real hope of change.

This change has to come quickly before more children are stunted and more lose their mental capacity to think and to reason. This, after all, is what is happening in the country. Mothers everywhere are anaemic, according to statistics released officially and more and more people suffer sicknesses that could be prevented by better nutrition and better healthcare.

We need somehow to break the chain of poverty which binds the people and move away from its iron grip so that we can truly move towards progress which involves change for all and not just those who are already wealthy or relatively well off. Change needs to come for every Pakistani and the sooner this happens, the better off the nation will be.

The writer is a freelance columnist and former newspaper editor.

She can be reached at: kamilahyat@hotmail.com