SARGODHA was a well-planned city with spacious parks and playgrounds but now it has become overcrowded and congested owing to encroachments and mushroom growth of unapproved private residential colonies and commercial plazas.

There are over 300 private colonies but all of them lack the facility of clean drinking water and appropriate arrangement for disposal of sewage. Owners of new residential schemes are spending huge amounts on publicity to attract people and most of them have achieved their goal by inviting government functionaries to their functions.

Saline and hard subsoil water cannot be declared fit for human consumption but still the owners are making tall claims regarding all facilities, particularly provision of clean water. It is strange that the Tehsil Municipal Administration has failed to make proper arrangements to provide potable water and dispose of sewage despite the Rs300 million special grant disbursed for the purpose.

A property dealer, Muhammad Younus, alleged that the negligent attitude of TMA had increased miseries of inhabitants of the city. He said more than half of the private colonies neither had any approved plan from the municipal authority nor they paid royalty for conversion of cultivated land into a residential area. He said although the sub-registrar (urban) had stopped registration of sale deeds, the sub-registrar (rural) was doing this job after taking money from owners and buyers. This state of affair has become a problem for buyers and other inhabitants.

Similarly, commercial plazas are being constructed in residential areas without any approval of the respective authorities. It would not be out of place to mention here that the Improvement Trust had set up a residential colony by the name of Model Town but despite a lapse of two decades it is not considered fit for construction of houses. The trust has collected development as well as gas charges but so far neither gas has been supplied nor any development work carried out. If some roads were constructed, those have vanished and even its water reservoir has been declared dangerous. If this is the situation of a colony set up under the umbrella of the government, how will private colonies built on a very small area cater to needs of the inhabitants?

It was suggested by estate dealers that no developer or planner be allowed to start booking and publicity of any residential or commercial area until it has been approved by the local council concerned and experts.

There are several commercial plazas, which have been constructed or are under construction but nobody can guarantee their quality. Therefore, plazas should be constructed under the constant supervision of experts and each and every step should be certified and in case of any eventuality, the relevant experts and builders should be held responsible. An estate dealer suggested that there should be a special guarantee in the shape of a deposit with a scheduled bank, which should not be less than Rs10 million and which should not be refunded before two years after its completion.

Besides this, encroachers are active here and they have influenced the agencies concerned. The poor affectees could not avail themselves of the benefit of the special act formulated for illegal dispossession but as yet no case can be quoted under the said law since 2005. The anti-corruption establishment of Sargodha was active against such people and some encroachers have been rounded up and their bail rejected by the anti-corruption special judge, but still this mafia has control over the local management.

Syed Ghulam Abbas Bukhari, ex-president of district bar association and father of the slain judge of Sialkot Syed Shehryar Bukhari, disclosed that 21 kanals and three marlas situated in Herbanspura, Cantt tehsil, Lahore, were allotted to four slain judges, including Syed Shehryar Bukhari, Asif Mumtaz Cheema (both from Sargodha), Saghir Anwar, Shahid Munir Ranjha and two injured civil judges Sibtain Kazmi and Javed Iqbal Warriach, in July 2005 vide letter No.2083 in Khasra No 347 and 349 by the Punjab Board of Revenue in recognition of their services. But this fact was not intimated to the bereaved families. This fact was also confirmed by Chaudhry Naseer Ahmed Cheema, Sargodha DBA president and uncle of Asif Mumtaz Cheema.

Ghulam Bukhari said value of the land was not less than Rs90 million and when he refused to surrender before the officials involved in the killing of four civil judges, the corrupt officials of the Board of Revenue without intimation to any of the bereaved families sold the entire land to a private school for Rs30 million just at a throwaway price. He said that was a glaring example of corruption and highhandedness of the board officers who had not even spared the martyrs of judiciary. How will they do any justice to commoners?

He added that in memory of the gallant act of Syed Shehryar Bukhari, the TMA through a unanimously adopted resolution named the road passing along the canal rest house as “Shehryar Bukhari Shaheed Road” and a board was fixed there but after one-and-a-half years it was removed as “I preferred to fight the murder case of sons of judiciary and ignored all pressures and threats.”

In Sargodha, a piece of land allocated to a missionary school has been disposed of with the connivance of some people although the same cannot be used for any other purpose as banned by the President of Pakistan vide an ordinance in 2002. Similarly, the state land situated in and around the city was also coming under illegal possession of some influentials, who were busy looting the innocent people. A residential colony adjacent to Tariqabad was bulldosed a couple of weeks ago, forcing the innocent poor people to live under the sky.

The question arises as to why the administration remained a silent spectator when the encroachers started making permanent construction there, and why they are allowed electricity connection and other facilities by government departments?

MANY people like Habib Fida Ali, the famous architect, are not happy with the recent celebrations encapsulating Hamara Karachi. In a letter written by him last week to Dawn, he called the idea, ‘a sick joke’.

Considering that Karachi is in a shambles, one may hardly find enough reason to celebrate anything at all.

It is assumed that either those who bosom unrelenting love for this city or those who glue their eyes on to their TV monitors installed on the dashboards of their air-conditioned cars, ignoring the tattered roads and suffering areas, would be most enthusiastic about the event.

One cannot disagree with Habib Fida Ali as the condition of Karachi today does not merit much room for jubilation. The numbness set in the psyche of the common Karachiites is bothersome but it has not crept out of a vacuum.

Though Karachi depends on parallel support systems as civic amenities have collapsed as a result of a spiralling population leading to water and power mismanagement and an anarchic law and order, it remains the responsibility of the state to look after the welfare of the citizens.

Memories cannot be erased easily, nor can facts that have led us to such a dismal situation. But should we continue to play the blame game which doesn’t lead us to any results and only makes our bellies lighter by letting out pent up emotions? Or should we drain the country of its finest brains?

Karachi has simply not been owned by those who came looking for work, better education or other opportunities.

The times when mayors like Jamshed Mehta used to have the streets of Karachi washed every other night, seem a farce in the face of today’s reality. The feeling was that of being the sons (and daughters) of the soil, a feeling that most of us lack today. This has to be emphasized some way or the other.

Hamara Karachi may seem an initiative by some affluent citizens who may not (or choose to) be travelling back and forth the dug up roads or clogged streets on a daily basis, it has made them connect with other parts of the city as nazims in every union council and town have planned events to foster the feeling of belongingness.

“The Hamara Karachi festival is being celebrated by the citizens of Karachi,” said Naib Nazim Nasreen Jalil in a press conference held last month, “and in no way is it a function of any organization, city or provincial governments”.

While the city government has made no financial contribution to the events, it attaches the goodwill of the government to the mega event planned by the Hamara Karachi Foundation.

The Foundation has raised money independently to funnel the events being held in towns and other areas.

“We have not delayed payments of the singers, actors and other people performing or helping in the events,” says a spokesman.

“Had it been any political organization’s show, the corporate sector may have refrained from funding the events. We want to celebrate the togetherness and the sense of belongingness that this city desperately lacks apolitically.”

Along the platinum jubilee celebrations of the KMC old building begun in 1895, many other relevant features of Karachi are to be highlighted – the fish harbour festival, the historical buildings of Karachi, film festivals and an enactment of the famous trial of Maulana Mohammad Ali Jauhar (Azadi kay Mujrim) at the Khaliqdina Hall.

Such features should tell our children what a great legacy we live with, just like other cities do. They should not be just listening to our cynicism all the time, which is not out of reality, but it just distorts their sense of belongingness and trust.

This event will only fade cynicism from people like Habib Fida Ali if it remains as genuine as it sounds.

While the event manages to clinch finances from the corporate sector, the city should benefit from it in other relevant areas too, the development of the infrastructure being the most significant part.