| December 21, 2001 | Friday | Shawwal 5, 1422 |
Eid still brings happiness to Karachiites: CITYSCAPES
Resource-sharing gains ground among libraries
The dying streams of Islamabad
Enchanting songs of Surayya
The woes of fishermen
Most of the Karachiites celebrated Eid with usual enthusiasm. Some even got up to five days off from work. Schools were in any case closed for winter vacations and therefore the city may have seen an unusually high incidence of socialization.
THANKS to the revolution in the fields of electronics and communications, it is now possible for music lovers to listen to old songs recorded in the voices of old masters. Both in the audio and video categories, a large number of cassettes are now available in the market, which can provide hours of listening pleasure. I used one audio cassette last week to revive memories of a period in which original music was created and sung by celebrities in the film world.
OVER two million fishermen of Sindh are on the horns of a dilemma as they are being deprived of their only source of livelihood due to natural causes and the man-made laws. These fishermen have been sung even by Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai and for thousands of years their only vocation has been catching fish.
A new out-patients department would be constructed in the local DHQ Hospital at a cost of Rs3 million with the help of philanthropists. A large number of people from various walks of life participated in a ceremony held recently in the hospital to lay the foundation stone of the facility.
Speaking to the participants, Medical Superintendent Dr Jahan Zeb Khan said that the existing out-patients department constructed some three decades ago could not cater the needs of the increased number of patients. Hence the need for a capacious OPD was badly felt.
A retired judge of the Lahore High Court, Saeedur Rehman Farrukh, had offered to donate Rs350,000 to meet the needs of the ailing humanity. PMA’s Sahiwal President Dr Abdul Hamid also indicated that he would donate Rs100,000 for this purpose. With these donations it was decided to construct the new OPD.
District Nazim Rai Hassan Nawaz Khan appreciated this gesture of the donors and announced that he would provide Rs500,000 for the building. The site plan was prepared by the Buildings Department and the stone-laying ceremony was held to start the work.
On the appeal to the participants, a DHQ hospital gardener, Muhammad Ramzan, offered Rs100 from his salary when the medical superintendent announced a donation of Rs50,000 from his side and that of his wife, Dr Rubina Zeb.
More than Rs1 million funds were available at the time of the start of the work of the OPD. Later, each participant laid a brick in the foundation with prayers for the completion and success of the project.
Formerly known as DHQ Hospital, Montgomery (now Sahiwal), it was established in 1928 in the heart of the city near Saddar Bazaar Chowk, opposite the office of the Municipal Committee, with a facility of only 15 beds.
After about three decades, it was realized that this small unit could not meet the health needs of the rapidly growing population.
The present location of the hospital did not have space for adequate expansion. Hence a place was selected at a distance of about two kilometres from the city to construct the new building.
The DHQ Hospital started functioning in October 1960. It is an H-shaped building situated on Sahiwal-Faisalabad Road on a plot of around 42 acres.
Cardiology Unit was added to the hospital in 1983. With the help of the philanthropists and the then deputy commissioner, the late Tajammal Abbas, a ward at a cost of Rs6.4 million was added to the hospital in 1987. The ward is now known as ‘Rahmatul-Lil-Aalameen’ ward.
A para-medical school was constructed in the hospital premises with funds provided by the Asian Development Bank. The DHQ Hospital also has a Nursing Training School affiliated with the Pakistan Nursing Council, Islamabad, to accommodate 100 students.
At present, the hospital has four operation theatres in the departments of general surgery, gynae, eye & E.N.T, besides a labour room. Department-wise number of beds are: surgical 8, E.N.T. 27, urology 27, medical unit I & II 88, T.B. / chest 36, eye Ward-27, family ward 8, cardiac unit 33, gynae 33, paediatric 34 and emergency 8 (Total 402 beds).
The DHQ Hospital record for out-patients department showed that during the year 2000 the attendance of male, female and children was 1,81,389 while the Indoor admissions were recorded at 24,485.
DHQ Hospital budget allocation for the fiscal 2000-2001 was noted at around Rs45 million while the hospital income receipts for the calender year 2000 amounted to around Rs2 million.
During the year 2000-2001, the hospital has been provided with suigas, sewerage and drainage facilities, two incinerators for disposal of clinical waste. Besides, operation theatres and different hospital buildings have been renovated.
The hospital is facing many problems for which the relevant quarters have paid no attention, said the medical superintendent while talking to this correspondent.
Giving details, he said that 12 house officers were posted in the DHQ Hospital during 1983. At present, only three house officers are working in Sahiwal while the remaining nine are with the Services Hospital, Lahore, since their posting there.
All written and verbal requests to the health authorities have failed to get them back in Sahiwal.
No neuro surgeon has been posted at the hospital. There has been no C.T. scan machine. People have to travel hundreds of kilometres to get their patients checked either at Lahore or Multan. Provision of these facilities at the DHQ Hospital could prove a timely help for the patients from Sahiwal, Okara, Pakpattan, Bahawalnagar, Toba Tek Singh, Burewala and other adjoining areas.
The medical superintendent said that these two problems were brought to the knowledge of the Punjab Health Services director-General Dr Yaqoob Jaffar, during his visit to ‘Health Mela’ in Chak 3 and 4/14-L on October 2, last. The Health DG had promised to consider the demands sympathetically. Now the MS has sent a formal request in writing to move the cases.
The old building of the DHQ Hospital was renovated by the local Frishta family in 1978. The hospital on this premises is now running under the name of the Government Abdul Qayum Hospital. Former MNA Major Rafiq Safdar Frishta (retired) provided the expenses to pay homage to a family member, Abdul Qayum Frishta. This hospital now has 75 beds and is providing orthopaedic facilities to the people as part of DHQ Hospital, the medical superintendent said.
As there had been no sacrifice and only celebration after relatively easy winter and Ramazan, the aftermath of the Afghan war, the overall handling of political and economic affairs by the mandarins of the military government and the city’s crumbling infrastructure remained a major topic for discussion.
Shaukat Aziz’s promise of a bright economic future in the wake of the country’s pro-western stance during the American war against Afghans, the future presidential or parliamentary form of government (to be decided by the National Reconstruction Bureau), the release of convicted drug smuggler Ayub Afridi and the fact that fresh Ehtesab cases were being constituted against the spouse of the former elected prime minister, who has been detained for almost seven years, were also discussed.
Yet, there is no hope for the arrest of culprits responsible for the untimely and unfortunate deaths of three toddlers at a playground near Pak colony last week. A visit on the second day of Eid to the infamous Haroonabad playground revealed that the streets still lacked lights. The area was no different in terms of leakage of scarce water resources and not so scarce municipal sewage that remained popular topics for discussion in the city during the last six days.
The crumbling infrastructure was highlighted as residents had an opportunity of visiting many neighbourhoods during Eid. They found battered and darkened streets, water and sewage lines in equally dilapidated condition everywhere, baring parts of Clifton and Defence and some of their adjoining areas, mostly inhabited by the so-called ruling elite of the city.
Areas like Gulshan Iqbal and North Nazimabad that used to be peaceful neighbourhoods appear to have been hit on more than one count. The builders and commercial promoters converted them into a jungle of concrete and later the infrastructure was left to rot as victim of some communal prejudice. Blocks 4, 4-A, 3, 2, 1, 5, 6, 7 on one side of Rashid Minhas Road and 8,9,10 and 11, on the south of University Road, all appear to have been equally neglected by the civic authorities.
The municipal infrastructure condition of working class neighbourhoods at Orangi Town or Korangi has deteriorated beyond belief. People living in Khyber Colony or even at the main Banaras chowk claim that during the last two years the roads or tracks that once existed have simply melted away in a sea of government inaction. Most Karachiites may not believe but the fact is that it may not be wise for the city government highups to go cross-country for inspection. Any such attempt may result in severe damage to the official vehicles.
Lyari and most of the old city areas have remained without water for the last one month. This does not in any way mean regular supply for other areas in the city. The water supply situation in North Karachi, New Karachi and Gulistan-i-Jauhar was hardly any different from that of old city.
Another menace that afflicts the city these days is a widespread attack by mosquitoes and flies. While passing over any of our storm water drains, especially at sunset, one can hardly miss the towers of buzzing mosquitoes rising several feet in the air from the bed.
Everyone recognizes that meaningful pest control for this city is not possible by a few tiny mobile fumigation machines. A couple of months back the administration announced a comprehensive plan for fumigation including from the air but like all other announcements nothing actually happened. People at the helm of affairs, even with a little knowledge of the nation’s resources, must know of over a dozen spray aircraft belonging to department of plant protection, federal ministry of food and agriculture, rusting at Karachi airport. The problem for the city managers may be that they are a 1000-mile away from the ministry building located at the federal capital. However if someone could request the federal government for the use of the equipment, fumigation in Karachi could be a matter of days.
Fumigation specially needs to be carried over the sewage- infested breeding grounds like Lyari Naddi, Malir Naddi, Orangabad Nullah, Korangi Creek and garbage heaps in so many open grounds and play fields of the city. Sewage for example overflowing Korangi Road, or Chaudhry Khaliq-uz-Zaman Road near Submarine chowk, in front of Muhammadi Masjid near Guru Mandar, or behind Civil Hospital in old areas may be the prime candidate for deck level aerial spray in the city.
The conditions have deteriorated to an extent that a decision by the city government to hire small pickups to be loaded with inexpensive fibreglass tanks and small atomizer pumps for fumigation (readily available for a few hundred rupees) may not be a bad one. But that may need authority one really wonders if anyone in the city government has.
Resource sharing in libraries means both cooperative collection development and inter-library loan, or the movement of materials among libraries and other suppliers in response to users’ needs.
The tradition of inter-library loan is a little over 100 years old.
Driven by rising publication costs and static and often shrinking budgets, librarians are embracing resource sharing as an idea and need of the hour too.
Inter-library loan, document delivery, technical issues, intellectual property rights, cost of sharing, staffing and training for these services are issues of “how” to share resources.
The locus of concern is how to create an infrastructure to share resources efficiently rather than what resources will be available.
Financial constraints compel libraries to design strategies and systems to provide sources they can no longer afford, while new technology emphasises on access and retrieval as the principal solution to the problem.
Few institutions have been able to maintain acquisitions at the same level as in the past and the increased number of publications means that all research libraries, no matter how well funded, are acquiring a very small portion of world’s publications.
In his 1981 annual report on the University of Pennsylvania Libraries, Richard De Gennaro, revealed the trend between rising book production and declining materials budgets.
We have the potential of losing our society’s ability to capture the information that chronicles and documents our civilization. Cooperation comes to the rescue of research by providing the resources that individual universities and their libraries could no longer afford.
The declining ability to acquire a significant portion of the world’s publications is creating a shift in the concept of library as a warehouse of print-based collections to the idea of the library as the point of access to needed information, the report said.
“A library’s holding is defined by access, not by possession. In this new paradigm, libraries cannot be expected to support research from their own collections. It is not just the cost of acquiring materials, but also of processing, shelving, preserving and housing books that makes access more attractive than possession.”
It said that instead of being self-sufficient, each library must take materials from world libraries and make it accessible to its users. In return it should display the same magnanimity by readily supplying materials from its own collection to others, quickly and cost-effectively.
Pakistan faces an acute shortage of research material in the areas of population and environment. The reason being that the issues relating to sustainable development are relatively new. The material found in libraries is scattered and access is almost impossible.
To circumvent the above problems, the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) has set up a communication center on population and environment called Population and Environment Communications Centre (PECC).
The PECC is planning to establish a network — POPNET — of libraries to share information resources on population, environment and related subjects.
This coalition would enable members to access world’s information resource within available budget. The services of POPNET will help develop a society, which is aware of the issues of environment and population.
The POPNET will establish a formal inter-library loan (ILL) system amongst member libraries. In order to facilitate ILL, the network will suggest common library systems and procedures.
It will also help catalogue the library material and develop a bibliographic database which will be put together to form a union database.
The POPNET Union Database will be installed on the internet and would be made available to all member libraries. Where needed, the member library staff would be trained on the library systems, procedures and the softwares.—Mohammad Shehzad
Not long ago, the centuries-old waterways in Islamabad not only provided fresh potable water to the local residents, but were also known for their recreational value as both rich and poor used to arrange fishing and picnic parties alongside these streams.
There are about 15 big or small streams in the city, which were once home to fishes, turtles and a variety of aquatic life. Besides supporting the flora and fauna, these waterways played a pivotal in keeping the ecological balance in the area and giving the city its proverbial green outlook.
However, these streams have lately become so polluted and filthy that these are now a source of various diseases.
The reasons for the degradation of streams’ system are multifarious and inter-linked. These include throwing of different pollutants into these water channels like everyday household garbage, municipal and industrial waste and cow dung by the residents of various Kutcha Abadis.
Moreover, release of solid waste from industrial units and local hospitals into these water channels is of particular concern as it causes a number of diseases.
Around 39 industrial units in the Capital are releasing various pollutants into these streams, creating serious environmental hazards and destroying aquatic life. Equally responsible are the routine bureaucratic snags, and lack of co- operation and coordination among different government agencies.
There has hardly been any research work done on the causes of pollution in the Capital streams. However, some experts from international NGOs like Lead and the UNDP have undertaken some research work and made recommendations. But, again, the inefficient government machinery failed to implement these suggestions to save these water channels from becoming irreversibly polluted.
Although, industrialization, urbanization and population explosion have greatly contributed to the pollution of these streams, the gross negligence on part of agencies concerned like the CDA must also be taken into account.
The present disastrous situation could have been avoided, had the government authorities prepared a comprehensive plan to manage water resources through community’s participation. Although, some cosmetic measures have been taken to rectify the problem, nothing significant has been done to resolve the issue on permanent basis.
It is now a established fact that any sort of negligence in this regard can prove catastrophic. Nullah Leh disaster last summer should have opened our eyes. There is no doubt that if the authorities concerned had taken flood management measures in advance, there would not have been as much destruction as witnessed by the residents of twin cities.
As defined by those engaged with global environmental governance, the ‘tragedy of the commons’ in this part of the world merits urgent attention. It must be realized that threat to Islamabad’s flora and fauna is real and not imaginary. At present, a broad-based strategy is required to restore these water channels to their past natural glory.
It’s not about the non-availability of the sufficient resources, but the effective usage of available ones. We have to have a proper drainage and sewerage system, that can ensure smooth flow of flood water and waste to the specified places. The citizens should also be reminded of their responsibilities. They should avoid throwing household wastage into the streams.
A pollution-free streams’ system in the Capital is vital to the citizens’ health and the city’s natural beauty. The state functionaries concerned, media and civil society activists should work together to help turn the polluted streams into clean-water channels.—Ziaur Rehman Hashmi
From the mid-40s to the beginning of the 1960s, singer actress Surayya ruled as the queen of Indian cinema. Her popularity owed much to her pliable and dulcet voice, which was skillfully employed by frontline composers, including Khurshid Anwar, Naushad Ali, Sajjad Husain and Master Ghulam Haider.
Born as Surayya Jamal Sheikh in Gujranwala on June 15, 1929, she spent a few years of her early life in the Mohni Road area of Lahore before shifting to Bombay in 1940 along with her family. Her maternal grandmother and maternal uncle were reported to have influenced her life to such an extent that Surayya remained a forlorn, unmarried and unhappy artiste throughout her 20-year-long film career. It is said that her maternal grandmother prevented her from marrying because she was a major source of income for her family.
Surayya made her debut in 1941 as a child star in a film produced in Bombay. She also lent her voice for the recording of a few songs as a playback singer for a couple of films (Station Master and Ishara) before she did a small role in the film Anmol Ghadi, produced and directed by the legendary film celebrity, Mahboob. In that film, she also recorded a song, Socha tha kya, kya ho gia that was filmed on her. As a playback singer, she recorded several songs in the film Ishara, music for which was scored by Khurshid Anwar.
Two decades later during a conversation with me, composer Khurshid Anwar paid glowing tributes to Surayya who had sung in such blockbusters as Parwana and Singhar, which were composed by him during his stay in Bombay, now Mumbai. Comparing her to a blotting paper, the late composer claimed that Surayya could sing all kinds of songs without repeated rehearsals.
Surayya’s voice was used by other frontline composers, including Naushad, Husan Lal-Baghat Ram, Master Ghulam Haider and Sajjad, for the songs they composed for a number of successful films in which she had been cast to play the lead. The songs broke popularity records at the box office. Even after 50 years their enchanting freshness is still felt both by lay and discerning listeners.
Surayya was gifted with a voice, which did not require much training, and it is said that she started singing at a very young age as she was inspired by a musically congenial environment in the family. She could reproduce a popular song without much efforts.
This past week, I listened to a cassette marketed in Pakistan by Shalimar Recording Company which contains twenty of her most popular songs selected from different films produced in Mumbai. These songs became popular in the 1940s and the 1960s.
For those who believe that the modern fad of pop and disco music is a transitory phenomenon, songs composed and recording during the golden period of the sub-continental cinema provide entertainment of an enduring impact. For many, these songs revive nostalgic memories of the good old days when film songs used to be original and were directly or indirectly composed in the backdrop of classical ragas. The fact that songs of that era still retain enchanting qualities and sonic freshness substantiate the point.
Included in the cassette referred to above are such popular songs as Bigri Bananay Wale (Husan Lal-Bhagat Ram in Badi Behan), Murli Wale Murli Bajaa (Naushad in Dil Lagi, Maire Munderey Na Bol and Jab Tum Hee Naheen Apne (Khurshid Anwar in Parwana), Chale Dil Ki Duniya (Naushad Ali in Dard) and Yeh Mausam aur Yeh Tanhai (Dastaan).
Composers of film songs and those who direct the movie claim that there was an extraordinary and peculiar aura in Surayya’s voice, which contributed much to her meteoric rise. Her voice was pleasingly pliant, radiating greater sonic depth for the young and the old alike.
After her voluntary retirement from showbiz, Surayya is now spending the evening of her life in complete seclusion in a fashionable locality of Mumbai. She said goodbye to the film industry, when she was in a position to dictate terms to the producers for a few more years but she decided to go while the going was good. It is a grim tragedy that leading lights and celebrities are totally forgotten only a few years after their retirement. Surayya is one such artiste about whom very little is known or heard now. When the late melody queen Nur Jehan visited Bombay in the 1980s, Surayya called on her and during the meeting talked nostalgically about the time she had spent in Lahore, the early years of her life. “Tears rolled down her cheeks when Lahore, the cultural granary of the Punjab was mentioned in their conversation”, the Nur Jehan disclosed in a brief meeting with me a few years ago.
According to the president of Sindh Taraqqi Passand Mallah Tanzeem, Muhammad Arab Mallah, the number of fishermen over the years has come down from five million to two million due to the dacoit factor and tyranny of the police and waderas. In the good old days, there used to be boathouses but at present the boathouses can only be seen in the Manchhar Lake, and these are managed by women of this community.
They are born in boathouses and live and die there. Boats were also used for transportation but only a few are left which operate in Sukkur and Guddu barrages. The introduction of the contract system by the vested interests had proved to be the last straw on the fishermen’s back. It was due to the excesses of the contractors that the fishermen were forced to unite on one platform and they formed the Sindh Taraqqi Passand Mallah Tanzeem in 1974. The following year the chief minister constituted a committee, comprising government and non-government members, to resolve the fishermen’s problems.
On the recommendations of the committee, a bill was introduced in the Sindh assembly and a notification was also issued abolishing the contract system for catching fish throughout the province. The contract system was replaced with the licence system, and licences were issued for catching fish in the five main lakes of the province, including the Keenjhar lake in Thatta and the Manchhar lake in Dadu. The licence system had a salutary affect on the living standards of the fishermen who became prosperous.
However, to sabotage the licence system the contractors, backed by some fisheries officers, filed a writ petition in the Sindh High Court but the court decided in favour of the fishermen. The case was taken to the Supreme Court. According to reports, the officials of the concerned department did not pursue the case, and the apex court authorized the Sindh government to legislate a law for the rights of the fishermen. This happened four years back but no law has yet been legislated to protect the rights of fishermen.
The fishermen of Sindh have also not been favoured by nature. There were times when the roars of the Indus could be heard right from Guddu up to the delta and it was given the name of mighty Indus but alas! Only dust is flowing in the mighty Indus down stream Kotri for the last so many years. Ironically, the two main civilizations of the subcontinent also derive their names from their rivers — the Indus valley and the Ganges valley. Due to the acute shortage of water in the Indus and non-implementation of the 1991 water accord in letter and in spirit, not only the growers but the fishermen have also suffered a great deal and are struggling for their survival.
For want of sweet water, the famous lakes and ponds of Sindh are drying up and their water has turned brackish. The poor fishermen who know no other vocation except catching fish are migrating from one place to the other. According to reports, the delta forest has been reduced from 223,000 hectares to 160,000 hectares and the sea water has eaten away 1.2 million acres of land. Due to this, the population of fish has also been reduced by 80 per cent.
Some of the unscrupulous fishermen despite complaints from the Sindh Taraqqi Passand Mallah Tanzeem continue to use the legally prohibited equipment to catch fish. The president of the Mallah Tanzeem, at an extended sitting, told Dawn that the famous “Pallah” fish would become extinct very soon and the coming generations would read about “Pallah” in the textbooks only. Quoting an example, Arab Mallah said that in the ‘60s a noted fisherman, Haji Muhammad Rahim, had netted 12,000 “Pallahs” just in one attempt but on Sept 8, 2001, when a television team visited Hussainabad, only two small “Pallahs” were caught in three attempts.
The president of the Sindh Taraqqi Passand Mallah Tanzeem, Arab Mallah, has expressed fear that if the government did not take notice of the predicament of the fishermen, two million fishermen will become extinct like the Pallah itself. It appears that there is not enough water in Sindh due to which the delta cannot be rehabilitated. However, to a certain extent, the livelihood of the fishermen can be saved through administrative measures.
The provincial government is under legal and moral obligation to abolish the contract system for catching fish and re-introduce the licence system. It should be ensured that the law about the use of prohibited equipment for catching fish should be enforced rigidly, the fishermen should be given interest-free loans and employment quota for their children in the fisheries and agriculture departments and shipping companies should be reserved and the directive of the Supreme Court for promulgation of law for the protection of fishermen’s rights should be implemented.
It is equally important to ban the catching of small fish. Moreover, the fishermen should be considered for allotment of kutcha lands.