A member of Awami Baithak reads a book for the study circle.

LAHORE: The stench of toxic dumping is inimical. Plastic bags – hundreds of them – float like corpses on the blackened water in the drain. Mosquitoes can almost be seen breeding. On either side are shops. Barber shops and women’s beauty shops, water pipe suppliers and fruit sellers. None of these people though is perturbed by the filth that surrounds him or her. Exhausted from a day spent fasting, some of them drag chairs outside under the overcast sky, and sit outside, even though this is all they can see.

Chungi Amar Sadhu is an area infamous for its industries wreaking havoc on its surroundings. And exactly opposite the main road is a passage leading to Ghulam Mohammad Bhatti Colony, a densely-populated area, with unpaved roads. Resilient and solid, the factories loom tall over such colonies which have in fact slowly become ghettos. And these factories have not just ended up dumping their waste in these areas. Many other issues also arise. For example child labour: area residents say that too many young people under the age of 16 are being employed by these factories. Most employees who work in these factories are not given minimum wages, and even if they are, they still send their children to work because the pay is not enough for them.

Worse still, often incidents of sexual abuse crop up. But today the biggest issue the Colony residents are facing (other than that of basic utilities) is the problem of drug addiction. “We have heroin, hash, alcohol, and even capsules with strange drugs inside them,” says an area resident, Ahsan Bhatti.

“First it was all about smoking up but since a year things have turned even more serious and now the use of syringes has increased. Only last month three dead bodies have been found of young men who have overdosed.”

The price of a cigarette of heroin or hash sold here is cheaper than a day’s meals. From Rs30 to 50 a user can get his stuff easily from a secret location deep inside Chungi Stop.

“There is a brick house with a corner which has one brick missing. Drug users all go there and give their money and take their preferred drugs and all transactions are done anonymously through the space of that one missing brick,” says another area resident. Issues of drug addiction are indeed deeply entrenched and child labour, unemployment, poverty and lack of education all go hand in hand with drug abuse and addiction. Most of all it is lack of recreation for youth that makes them choose that path.

This is where Ahsan Bhatti and the rest of the team at ‘Awami Baithak’ comes in. They are armed with a determination to drive back these forces that have diseased their young people. There are about 42,000 registered voters in Ghulam Bhatti Colony, not counting the people who live on rent there, and Bhatti says about 60 to 70pc of the people there are under 30.

With the help of donors from NGOs like Umeed-e-Jawan and also from the Awami Workers Party, the Awami Baithak team began their work in 2007, and finally in 2015 have formed a proper office. But the work is completely independent of any political party, even though, the Progressive Youth Front has been at the helm.

The small house that the team has rented out for Rs13,000 and for which they pay themselves is running quite efficiently. About 15 to 20 students who have not ever studied, come for evening classes free of cost and are taught basic Urdu and mathematics.

“We want them to know how to read and write basic Urdu, and with math they can always do their own calculations now and later in life. This is important for being independent,” says Murtaza Bajwa, who is another worker in the same centre. “Through teaching and social interactions as well as in other ways we are proud to say that we have facilitated about 1,140 people in all.” And besides the basic classes, the youth is encouraged to participate in study circles where everyone reads the same page from a book and then discusses it, prompting ideas and intelligent discussions. For those who are more interested in extracurricular activities, there is debating, singing, acting, and sports which have proved cathartic and useful.

“We try to bring in more and more youth to spend time at our place,” says Rashid Gill, who works here voluntarily while he is a cameraman for a Lahore-based TV channel.

“All we want is for them to come in and sit here instead of hanging outside in the streets doing nothing. Here there is free wi-fi, we tell them how to use the internet on the computer and their phones. They have a TV, a small library. They can chat with each other. Most people are happy to have a place to run to by the end of the day. The government has never ever given our youth even a park to play in. So we have to take all this in our hands,” he says.

Obviously with no recreation, drugs are a logical end sometimes. There are some people who cannot stop. “There is a maulana in our neighbourhood who prays five times a day, but he admits that till he smokes hash at least twice a day, he remains restless,” says a resident who comes for Baithak meetings.

Like youth, women of all ages too are encouraged to come and join in. The young men come in at night after work. “An addicted person is somewhat a lost case,” says Bhatti. “We never turn anyone away, but that person does not usually stop. Our job is to provide a space for those who are yet uncorrupted to use their energies.”

Sajawal, a 15-year-old lad, proudly admitting that he is an all-rounder in cricket, had won a match recently. They have a cricket club called ‘Awami Club’ and had a match with a team in Township. Inter-club matches across Lahore have been a success with the Awami Baithak too and also gives players a chance to take their sports seriously.

“We cannot stop the generations before us many of whom have taken to drugs and other bad habits,” says Erum Khan of the Baithak. “But we can try and take care of the generation which is the future of this place. No one else will do this for us.”

Published in Dawn, July 22nd, 2015

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