A fear of numbers

The door-to-door head count of the country’s population, assisted by the military, has begun in many parts of the country. The exercise is a crucial one in a country where a rapidly expanding population size presents a real threat to its future.

According to eminent scientist Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy, there is now no way Pakistan can avoid reaching a population mark of 400 million people within around the next 35 years. This of course is something to fear. It would mean a catastrophe in terms of available food resources, water resources, housing needs and so much else.

But population size is not the only reason why the census, considered an innocuous exercise in most countries, is so widely feared at home. In the majority province, Punjab, there is a fear of the possible loss of seats in the National Assembly if the population sizes of other federating units are found to have expanded proportionally more than that of Punjab. Punjab currently holds 138 seats in the 242-member legislature and would naturally not be happy to give up any of these. It is therefore continuing to seek a formula under which the division of seats would remain the same regardless of population numbers.

There is also the question of whether other urban centres beyond Lahore have expanded as many believe is the case. This would create a strong argument for the reallocation of funds away from Lahore and to other emerging centres where the demand for greater facilities for increasing populations will rise.

Other issues, such as language, and the number of Seraiki speakers in Punjab, also hold significance given the move in recent years for the creation of a new province based on language. It is not only in Punjab that language is important. It holds even greater potential for turmoil in the capital of Sindh, Karachi, where Mohajirs fear a possible fall in numbers in proportion to Sindhis who have moved in from rural areas. There is also a controversy over how Mohajirs should identify themselves as an ethnic group. Sindhis have demanded that today, nearly 70 years after Partition, they call themselves ‘new Sindhis’ or simply Sindhis. A campaign is already underway in Karachi and other urban centres of Sindh for Mohajirs to list themselves as Urdu speakers. It is in so many ways significant that we have not overcome these clashes over ethnicity, identity and the political realities associated with these even seven decades after 1947.

The issues of ethnicity are perhaps most crucial in Balochistan. Both the current chief minister of the province, Sanaullah Zehri, and his predecessor Dr Abdul Malik Baloch had suggested that the census in the province be postponed until the estimated one million or so Afghans living in it could move home or away from Balochistan. The overriding fear is that the Baloch could surface as a minority in their own province with the Pakhtuns overtaking them in terms of numbers. This would bolster the Baloch nationalists’ argument that there has been a deliberate conspiracy to move people who are not Baloch into Balochistan – mainly Pakhtuns – thereby rendering the Baloch a minority.

The nationalistic fallout from this could be severe and the leaders in the province are already warning against it. Balochistan is thought to be almost evenly divided between the Baloch and the Pakhtuns, with a sizeable Hazara and Punjabi minorities. The census of course should bring out the true picture and because this picture is so significant, it is crucial that every effort is made to ensure the counting exercise is carried out freely, fairly and with complete impartiality. Otherwise we risk complete turmoil.

The problem of numbers lurks in every province. Even the former chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Aftab Sherpao, has stated that there have been attempts to show a lower number of Pakhtuns than is actually the case. Any manipulation of data would of course be a disaster. With the census also taking place in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), and a stronger call under way to include these territories in KP, other issues also arise.

While mainstreaming tribal territories may be beneficial for the people in many ways, provinces outside KP believe the addition of these numbers would lead to an increase in seats for KP, creating an imbalance or at least a different kind of balance. In Sindh, the discovery that some percentage of the province’s population lacks CNICs has delivered a sudden jolt to the provincial government which is now desperately attempting to issue these documents to secure numbers. The same would undoubtedly be true in other provinces – notably the more remote parts of Balochistan and KP – adding to further complications.

It is also true that women in particular lack documents proving their identity. This has, in the past, led to an undercounting of women. We can only hope the civil administration and the military would work together to avoid this.

There are additional, indistinct factors that are hard to define. Organisations and individuals involved in survey exercises point out that not only in Pakistan, but across the Subcontinent, people are often reluctant to divulge accurate information about their families and personal lives. While a penalty has been put in place for giving out untruthful information – a fine and a short prison term – there is very little awareness about it. Moreover, there is also very little knowledge about why a census is so important.

The media and other channels need to be utilised to inform people more fully about how a census can be beneficial to them in terms of planning and the division of resources. The fact that so many people are fearful of strangers who walk to their doors and ask detailed questions about their family size, children in school and other matters illustrates the degree of distrust between the state and citizens. Many people are unwilling to believe that the census is simply a routine exercise intended to acquire knowledge about the manner in which the demographics in a country are set up and how its population is spread across provinces and between rural and urban areas.

Yet this information is of course vital to planning our future. Right now we need to consider if we have a future at all given the dismal failure to control population growth. There is a belief within international organisations that Pakistan’s full population size and the rate of growth are not officially disclosed in many documents. While removing the fear of people and provinces about the head count, we do need to be watchful of what the figures say and to use them to try and secure for ourselves a safer future. A future, in which people have even less than is currently the case, is naturally a terrifying one.

The census should be the first step in leading us away from such a future and allowing planners and government leaders to formulate strategies that can possibly save us while also lessening the ethnic tensions that still exist almost everywhere in the country. The census should also help leaders shape the country’s politics and its social dynamics. It is time we move towards a more realistic acceptance of our diversity and embrace and enjoy it.

The writer is a freelance columnist and former newspaper editor.

Email: kamilahyat@hotmail.com