| March 27, 2002 | Wednesday | Muharram 12, 1423 |
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Law and order situation
Expensive Internet hours
Education in cantonments
Telephone bills
Bus stops for colleges
Do we qualify for loans?
GST on medicines
The Sangh Parivar
Insurance against divorce
Seeking donations
Issuance of NICs
Hiring teachers
Sunday Book Bazaar
THIS is with reference to Kunwar Khalid Younus’ letter (March 20). I, like many other Karachiites, share his concerns. However, the causes for encroachments rather than just their prevention need to be addressed.
Karachi requires about 80,000 housing units per year. The formal sector only succeeds in facilitating provision of land and the building of 25,000 units. Where should the rest of the demand go? There are three options: one, create new katchi abadis; two, densify old katchi abadis and formal low income settlements; and three, live on the pavements as in Bombay. The last option is increasing rapidly as inner city katchi abadis cannot densify any further and the peri-urban ones are becoming too far for commuting economically to work and back. Plots developed in the past for low income groups never reached them as they were far too expensive for poor Karachiites and migrants to afford. They were purchased by the middle classes for speculation.
There are other encroachments as well. These include the encroachment of roads for their use as bus terminals, workshops and depots along with toilet and other facilities for the transporters. In some cases more than 70 per cent of road space has been occupied by these activities. The Governor’s Task Force for the Improvement of Municipal Services was supported by the TEB which identified 36 spaces for intra-city bus terminals and three locations for inter-city bus terminals. Meanwhile, the occupation of the roads by the transporters, in the absence of an alternative, continues.
Important job providing economic activities located within the city need space to grow. Such space for growth in an appropriate manner has not been provided, with the result that these activities are flowing out onto the pavements and roads, transforming huge inner city areas into godowns and informal small scale industrial activity. This activity includes garbage sorting and recycling (mainly along the Lyari Corridor) which needs to be shifted to landfill sites and is quite willing to shift if infrastructure is made available. Much of the streets and open spaces of Karachi’s inner city have been transformed into informal cargo handling terminals in the absence of formal ones. Space is needed for them and this can be provided on the Northern bypass along with creating residential areas for workers and related storage and small scale manufacturing. Then there are hawkers, constantly being evicted, and returning only to pay an increased bhatta. They too can be accommodated on pedestrianized streets as in so many Third World (and even First World) cities.
However, governments are interested in building flyovers and expressways rather than tacking these very basic planning issues. If these issues are tackled, then many of these multi-billion mega-projects, which bring so much physical, economic and social devastation in their wake, would become unnecessary.
Also, what is the land mafia that we keep referring to? Not one square yard of land in Karachi can be encroached upon without the involvement of government agencies and then touts and the poorer sections of Karachi’s population pay informally through their nose for such encroachments for years on end. They would be happier to pay taxes.
ARIF HASAN
Karachi
NO one in Pakistan and abroad can deny that the law and order situation in our country is appalling. Many innocent people have been victims of violence.
The merciless killing of Daniel Pearl, an American journalist, over a month ago must be condemned by everyone. Then there was the massacre of innocent worshippers in a church in Islamabad. No effort should be spared to apprehend the culprits.
Gunmen murdered about 10 people in a mosque in Rawalpindi while they were praying. No one has been arrested. This is not the first killing in a mosque. A number of such killings have been committed in the recent past. The criminals have not been caught yet. I wonder who these people are? They have no respect for holy places, their religion and their fellow beings.
While the present government has taken certain steps to improve the law and order situation, the results are still unsatisfactory. Many doctors have been killed in Karachi but no stringent action has been taken against the murderers.
The Pakistani government has to take some harsh measures to eliminate this evil from society. Some suggestions in this regard are:
Strict monitoring of the borders to check unauthorized entry into the country.
Exemplary punishment to those who commit sabotage.
Carrying of weapons in public places must be banned and those disobeying the law must be severely punished.
People should inform the police about any suspicious acts noticed.
Law-enforcement agencies should be trained to carry out their duties in a professional way. Their working condition should be improved.
IMTIAZ AHMAD
London, UK
THE Ministry of Science and Technology deserves congratulations on starting Virtual University with affordable fees for middle class students. But since a minimum of 90-100 Internet hours have to be purchased by the students from the ISPs in order to follow the lessons on PTV II for two hours daily, it turns out to be expensive.
No matter how much concession the government gives to the ISPs where bandwidth charges are concerned, they fail to pass on the benefits to the students, let alone the general public. Where they pretend to extend concession, they take it back by slowing the speed of their servers.
Normally they charge Rs15 per hour, which means if a student uses the Internet for 100 hours, he must pay an additional amount of Rs1,500 to ISPs each month. Where some of the ISPs sell time on the Internet at the rate of Rs6/7 per hour, their service is worse than those who sell them for Rs15 per hour. Many more hours are spent on account of the very slow speed of servers. There are also innumerable disconnections which increase telephone bills.
As representatives of the consumers in general, and the student community in particular, following are the suggestions to solve the problem:
The ISPs may be instructed by the government to sell Internet hours to genuine students at the rate of Rs5 per hour. But without sacrificing the speed of servers and other aspects of Internet service. Only then can those who study in Virtual University fully avail themselves of the benefits offered to them.
It is hoped that expeditious action in this regard will be ordered by the Ministry of Science and Technology.
AMIR ALI ESMAIL
Karachi
THE educational institutions managed by the Cantonment Boards in Pakistan used to be the envy of all other schools, both inside and outside the cantonments, because of their high academic standard and quality. The Federal Ministry of Education took over these institutions on June 1, 1975, and made them governable under the Civil Servants Act 1973.
Nowhere did the ministry in its letter dated May 26, 1975, indicate anywhere that the administrative control of these institutions was transferable to another organization.
But due to unexplained reasons these federal government institutions were placed under the management of the Army, resulting in the monopolization of admissions in favour of the children of Army officers and against those of the civilians, which constitute 95 per cent of cantonment population.
This discriminatory act, in practice ever since, is in violation of Article 25 (1) of the Constitution of Pakistan 1973. Therefore, in all fairness and justice these Federal Government educational institutions should either be managed directly by the Education Ministry for their expenditure is met from the Civil Estimates and not Defence Estimates, or their management should be transferred back to the Cantonment Boards that comprise representatives of the cantonment tax-payers as envisaged in Article 32 of the Constitution.
With the reversion of complete administrative and fiscal control of the cantonment schools to the Federal Ministry of Education, the constitutional rights of the civilian residents will be restored.
The Army may continue to run and even expand the existing network of Army public schools and colleges for the exclusive benefit of the armed forces.
M. IBRAHIM NIAZ
Islamabad
I WISH to highlight, for necessary action by competent authorities, the torture that is suffered by telephone subscribers who regularly pay their bills well before the last date.
It is wrong to assume that one’s troubles are over after such a payment. The inefficient, lazy and underworked staff of the bank does not forward the paid bill to the central headquarter in Islamabad on time. The result is that the amount paid is shown as ‘arrears’ in the next bill. The harassed subscriber has to run from pillar to post to get his bill corrected. This involves travelling (on working days) to distant exchanges and waiting in queues for hours.
It is vital that both the bank authorities and the telephone department take notice of this anti-public attitude of the relevant staff and punish those responsible for torturing the taxpayers in this way.
In this connection, I would also like to highlight the anti-client attitude of the National Bank of Pakistan (Karachi University Campus branch) employees who do not forward paid telephone bills causing trouble for the university staff. The staff there behaves offensively with clients. ‘Perform or perish’ should be the slogan for nationalized banks.
S.M. WASTI
Karachi
THIS is with regards to the recent accident in which two students and a motorcyclist were killed due to the rash and undisciplined driving of a bus driver. The government is taking steps against the driver and the police constables who were responsible for this incident.
As far as the students of that particular college are concerned, the government has ordered the construction of a bus stop for them so that they can be safe from such accidents in future.
The government should also look at the other colleges and schools around the city where students are facing similar problems. Some schools/colleges don’t have bus stops at all, while some don’t have shades where students can wait for their buses sheltered from the afternoon heat.
The government should look at this problem seriously and take precautionary steps before another similar incident takes place.
HAMMAD MATEEN
Karachi
THIS is with regard to a news report by Masood Haider from New York (March 19), which quoted our Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz as saying, “We believe that throwing money in a bottomless pit is not good for the donors or the recipients.” He went on to say: “Money should only be given when countries show seriousness about reforms, show good governance and transparency and there is no element of corruption in how the money is spent.”
Mr Shaukat Aziz is requested to give up the rhetoric, take a deep look at the way the Pakistani tax-payers’ money is spent on such luxurious tours abroad like the one he went on, and then question his conscience. The answer will obviously be that Pakistan does not qualify for even a penny.
When are we, the people of Pakistan, going to fend for ourselves? Think it over, sir.
PROF ARIF UR REHMAN
Karachi
A FIFTEEN per cent GST on medicines will put extra burden on the already overburdened shoulders of the poor patients who recently received a superfluous load of drug prices when, according to the reports, an official raise of 3 and 4 per cent was transmitted to the market as 30 and 40 per cent.
When a similar decision was taken in 1998-99, the ministry of health took a firm stand against it and convinced the CBR to drop the proposal. The GST was thus not levied on drugs.
It is hoped that the ministry would take similar measured action this time as well to convince the relevant ministries otherwise, so that the poor of the society could be saved from this additional load.
PROF GHAYUR AYUB
Islamabad
OVER a thousand Muslims have been killed at the hands of frenzied mobs unleashed by the Sangh Parivar. In the face of such blatant genocide the likes of Modi and Advani have the cheek to blame the ISI for the carnage, when it was Advani’s primitive and ludicrous rath-yatras that resulted in the 1992 massacre of Muslims as well as the current genocide. Modi, not to be outdone by Bal Thakray, gloated about revenge. But, against whom? Any Muslim who comes his way?
Over the last two decades or so, all of us who share the vision of a sane India have been continually depressed and bewildered by how the Sangh Parivar has managed to vitiate the communal atmosphere in the country.
India’s twin pillars of secularism and democracy have taken a severe beating at the hands of these quasi-fascists, and India seems to be heading slowly but surely towards a Hindu theocratic state. The carnage in Gujarat is but the latest manifestation of this inexorable process.
SANJEEV MAHAJAN
San Francisco,
USA
DIVORCE generally creates a social problem for women and although provision for financial relief in the form of payment of mehar is there, yet many men make their wives absolve them from the payment of mehar, half or even full in some cases.
So steps need to be considered to obligate the husband to pay for the maintenance of his wife if he divorces her. One such step can be insurance against divorce.
If divorce does occur, the beneficiary of the insurance policy, the wife, will get full amount of the sum assured under this policy for which the husband will be making payments of the premium according to the annual premium quoted to him by the insurance company at the outset of the policy.
M.M. KHAN
Karachi
THIS is with reference to the news item ‘Action ordered against schools seeking donations’ (March 17). The said school is still adamantly collecting Rs25,000 per child under the garb of ‘Security Deposit’.
Will the Sindh Education Department, for the sake of the purpose for which this department is existing, seriously take steps to deter the school from collecting funds coercively under flimsy pretexts. If the Sindh Education Board is helpless, will it please apprise the authority to whom parents can plead.
REHAN UR REHMAN
Karachi
THIS is with reference to a news item (March 22) that ‘old NICs to remain valid till issuance of new cards’. This is a decision which should have been taken long back. While accepting application, delivery periods indicated were four weeks, six weeks, which proved allusive.
Even after passing of six months, cards have not been delivered. Concerned authorities should better look into the workings of NADRA rather patting on their backs.
S. M. ALI
Karachi
THIS is with reference to the letter ‘Hiring teachers’ (March 20). The writer complained about the incompetence of teachers.
I would like to inform the writer that there is a reliable criteria for hiring teachers: an outstanding graduate or master degree or a PhD in the related field, and an interview to assess firsthand the knowledge and confidence of the candidates.
I would also like to say that sound communication between students and teachers is very important for developing an atmosphere of confidence in any institution, and for this both the sides have to work equally hard.
A STUDENT
Karachi
I AM not against the establishment of the Sunday Book Bazaar at Frere Hall. But I feel that though the Frere Hall Book Bazaar is a great effort, the Regal Bazaar should not be removed.
Since the Regal Sunday Book Bazaar has been here for a long time, it is a matter of convenience for both the booksellers and the buyers. Second-hand and inexpensive books are sought by people of middle and lower-middle class who come here in buses, and it is very convenient to come to Regal by bus and buy books.
Also, since recently a number of electronic shops have started keeping themselves open on Sundays and blue collar workers who work six days a week, in factories etc, and who can do their shopping only on Sundays can buy books at a lower price here.
At the Frere Hall, the booksellers have to pay for the table, the shamiyana and the tubelights. This then reflects on the prices of the books. Also all second-hand booksellers cannot pay even for these meagre facilities. For example, there are a few booksellers like elderly persons who can only bring a handful of brochures and magazines and sell them at Rs3 per piece. Then there are booksellers who sell all books at the same price, say Rs5 or Rs10 per book. I do not feel that they can pay for the facilities offered at the Frere Hall.
In Bohri Bazaar, the cloth sellers put up their stalls on the road, in the main bazaar and in the sidelanes. If the clothwallas and other item-sellers can be given permission to do business, why not second-hand booksellers? If one of the lanes near Co-operative Market or Naveed Clinic could be closed and the second-hand booksellers allowed to sit there on Sundays only, I do not think it would cause inconvenience to anyone. Karachi is a big city and we have second-hand booksellers scattered all over the place, then why stop them from sitting in Saddar at the Regal Chowk, as they have been doing, from what I have heard, since the establishment of Pakistan?
A CITIZEN
Karachi
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