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TWO years ago this summer, on the two holidays following Eidul Fitr, Karachiites, as is usual for summer holidays and weekends, flocked to the several open-access beaches located not too far from them. In this city of upwards of 18 million people, outdoor entertainment opportunities are few; the beaches are often visited by hundreds of thousands of people at a time.
It is perhaps a measure of Karachi’s bad karma that the season when one most wants to go to the beach — when homes and offices are stifling and the electricity supply is intermittent — is also the one when the tides are at their most treacherous. The monsoon system causes the otherwise relatively placid waters on the shores of this part of the Indian Ocean to rise up with no little degree of violence.
So it is that every year, the city loses a few lives to the waters. Lifeguards or policemen patrolling the beaches — even the Sea View strip that is half an hour from most parts of the city and a central feature of the affluent area of town — are woefully few in number; their inadequate training, equipment and remuneration made all the more glaring when they face a flood of humanity. On its part, the citizenry tends to be strongly averse to any form of policing or discipline, even it is for its own good.
Apart from obduracy, there is another, fairly significant, reason to be found for this heedlessness. For the majority, getting to the beach is neither easy nor particularly affordable. This is a country where outings are few and families large; public transport is abysmal and, in any case, scarce on Sundays. And few have relatively easy access to a vehicle; if they do, it is overwhelmingly a motorcycle.
Accordingly, a trip to the beach is something planned days, even weeks, in advance. People pool their resources and rent or otherwise press into service buses and coaches, rickshaws and ancient four-wheelers. Apart from the travel, there is a large quantity of food and drink to be arranged; biryani, thanda and ice enough for everyone.
The monsoons are upon us and the waters are treacherous.
For many families, it is a once or twice a year excursion, eagerly anticipated and fondly remembered. No wonder, then, that people are inclined to be a little more careless in their fun, a little more resentful at having their day cut down to anything less than they had hoped for.
After the 2014 Eidul Fitr holidays, once the city machinery swung ponderously back into action, an appalling figure emerged: some two dozen people had drowned in the monsoon tides over those holidays, most of them at Sea View.
The reaction was immediate and, while deeply problematic, it was certainly effective. Using Section 144, the city administration banned swimming in the sea. Law enforcement, aware that it would be unable to curb the energies of large numbers of people on the sand, set up road blocks to prevent people from getting to the beaches at all. On the weekends that followed, untold numbers of people were unceremoniously turned back.
The ban was eventually lifted, but by then the prime beach season was over. Then, last year, at around the same time, a ban was initially imposed during the Eid holidays which extended for six months. It wasn’t enforced; I was a regular visitor at Hawkesbay beach. But stopping persons such as myself had never been the point.
Now, the monsoons are upon us again. The Eid holidays are approaching, and the waters are already rough. Is the city administration doing anything to prevent the loss of life? Not so far, apparently.
The Sea View beach sprouted a few new guard towers last year, but there are no greater numbers of city-employed lifeguards to be spotted. I haven’t come across any news of greater investment in safety infrastructure on the sands. And if the problem is an undereducated citizenry, where is the drive to increase their knowledge of the risks during the monsoons?
Further, it is worthy of notice that the majority of drowning deaths took place at Sea View, which had until 2014 followed the general pattern of one or two or three. But recent years have seen much ‘development’ near the sea in this part of town, from land reclamation projects to the construction of a massive high-rise building. Even as a layperson, I know that changing the shape of the seashore can alter the way the waters behave. Before resorting to bans that make poorer the quality of the average citizen’s life, the administration needs to produce research that proves that this was not a self-created problem.
It is a lament oft heard in this country … for once, can something be done before tragedy occurs and a ban is imposed? Can we learn to ride the wave rather than always be engulfed by it?
The writer is a member of staff.
Published in Dawn, June 20th, 2016
