City Dialogue Series initiated

LAHORE : The Urban Unit has initiated “The Saturday City Dialogue Series 2018” at the Quaid e Azam Library, Lahore, with an aim to discuss the cities with special emphasis on the roles of citizens.

According to a press release issued here on Saturday, the first of the series was conducted by Dr Nadeem Haque, eminent scholar, writer and former deputy chairman of Planning Commission of Pakistan. He discussed the planning of cities keeping in view the citizens’ perspectives and livability issues in the spaces created in names of cities.

It was an informal interactive dialogue with some 100 and more participants questioning, cross-questioning and deliberating on various aspects of living in urban spaces.

Dr Nadeem laid stress on the significance of policy work and research to achieve the targets of economic development in Pakistan. He added that cities were vital being the centres for growth. He said that planned land development and vertical growth of cities could unlock the wealth for the country in longer run.

“Government has a major role to develop planned cities and markets to achieve the goal of provision of quality life to everyone.

And citizens have yet a bigger role in thinking and communicating with the planners for their good, but this process will start when we start pondering on our issues,” he added.

He concluded the session by highlighting the importance of creative thoughts and initiation of national conversation culture specifically among the youth.

Earlier, Dr Nasir Javed, chief executive officer, the Urban Unit, said choosing an auditorium of a public library for the initiative was an attempt to ensure participation of public and discuss views on a larger scale for viable solutions and healthy discussions.

Dr Salman Shah, former finance minister, Rafay Alam, lawyer and environment specialist, Mohiuddin Wani, DG Benazir Income Support Programme, Pervaiz Qureshi, known architect, Ayesha Zaman, master trainer at PITB, Dr Amin A. Siddiq, scholars, a large number of students from various colleges and universities, and representatives from many departments and companies were also present.