AND we thought that gridlocks didn’t happen in the ‘60s. They did. Surprisingly, they took place in the same localities in the city of Karachi as you may have seen or got stuck in recently.

Take, for instance, the road that is flanked by Napier Barracks (now Liaquat Barracks), one of the busiest thoroughfares these days known as Sharea Faisal. Let’s remind ourselves to freshen our collective memory that the barracks were named after Charles Napier, the British commander-in-chief in India who in 1842 (in)famously said after conquering Sindh ‘I have Sinned’. Yes, the same Mr Napier after whom a road in the old city is also named which not too long ago was known for its dancing girls.

On Jan 20, 1965, commuters found themselves in a spot of bother due to a huge traffic jam along Napier Barracks. At the time, the entire long strip was part of the National Highway linkup and reports suggested that the reason for the logjam was the arbitrary digging of the National Highway. Arbitrary? Not sure what that means in the context.

Obviously, had it been a smalltime blockage, the media might not have cared. In those days a lot of importance was given to issues related to public welfare. Health was one such issue, which was why on Jan 19 the health department of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) served notices to more than 250 hotels and eating houses to close down their business because of non-compliance with hotel regulations. Again, try doing that today.

Keeping with the theme of health, and bearing in mind the current polio vaccination situation in the city in particular and the country in general, we must also remind ourselves of the successful efforts made by the health authorities to eradicate smallpox from Pakistan. The KMC’s anti-smallpox campaign had led the way in the noble endeavour. On Jan 21, the corporation released a statement saying that more than 200,000 people had so far been vaccinated against the disease in different parts of Karachi. Of course, it couldn’t have been made possible unless the people hadn’t cooperated with the health department, something which needs to be done today in regard to polio eradication.

Another thing that needs to be done in our times is a significant increase in the number of libraries, digital or manual. It is baffling to note, and perhaps we already know about it, that 50 years back the tradition of going to libraries and filling them with books on a regular basis was a ‘given’ activity. Nowadays books have taken a back seat, for all the wrong reasons. On Jan 22, 1965 the Central Institute of Islamic Research drew up a plan to add rare books on Muslim personal law from Cairo, Baghdad and Beirut to their library. The plan was part of the library expansion programme, because that’s how societies develop and progress.

Speaking of development, on Jan 23, the district council approved 45 schemes (yes, 45) for the development of rural areas. The estimated cost for the scheme was Rs1,652,400. Come to think of it, if the district council had known that the concept of rural areas in Karachi would become nonexistent in the span of three to four decades, it might have spent the money on how to control the chaotic geographic and demographic growth of the city.

Published in Dawn, January 19th, 2015

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