The general election was round the corner. Whenever that happens in the country, Karachi takes centre-stage primarily because it is, demographically, the largest city of Pakistan. Therefore arrangements befitting its size are made. Or so one thinks.

On Sept 16, 1970 it was announced that 590 polling stations would be set up in Karachi district for 14,05,000 voters for National and Provincial assembly elections. Voters in the Sindh capital were to elect seven representatives to the National Assembly and 15 to Provincial. About 8000 presiding and polling officers, including 3000 women, had been assigned to man the process for both houses. Two hundred and forty stations were going to be exclusively established for women voters – the total number of women eligible to cast their vote in the district was approximately 600000. Constituency 129 for NA had the largest number of stations, 112, with 255000 voters.

One doesn’t know whether a citywide campaign launched against illicit arms by the police department a couple of days earlier had anything to do with the election. It was a good step nonetheless. The additional IG M Y Orakzai was quoted to have said that the drive was undertaken after receiving information that a big amount of arms had been smuggled into the city.

Another good omen that week was related to the supply of water. On Sept 17, a news item published in this newspaper read the Karachi Development Authority (KDA) had prepared a scheme for building a dozen reservoirs in various parts of the city to improve the water supply system. The scheme had been submitted to the provincial government for initial scrutiny and inclusion in the development programme for the fourth Five-Year Plan. At the time the city had only two main reservoirs – at COD Hills and in Muslimabad. Their capacity to store water was 30million gallons.

There may have been dearth of water or shortcoming in its supply to neighbourhoods, but there was no paucity of talent in Karachi when it came to the arts – and still isn’t. On Sept 16, a students’ drama festival was organised by the Bazm-i-Talba of Radio Pakistan’s Karachi Station. It was for the first time that the radio authorities had given the students the ‘run’ of the whole event. Although the eight plays in the festival did have a staff producer in charge for each drama, it was claimed that their authority was ‘nominal’. The young producers had been selected on the basis of their past performances in the bazm programmes, and the striking thing was that five out of eight were girls. It would be interesting to note here that a play, Aina Saz, produced by Neelofar Alim, was written by the young Parveen Shakir – yes, who went on to become one of the country’s finest poets.

And on Sept 17, artworks of a young painter impressed art lovers. He, years later, was recognised all over the world as a top-notch playwright with a flair for satire. The reference is to Anwar Maqsood, who, according to a critic, had revealed a lyrical sense of balance that gave a celestial touch to his new collection of paintings on display at the Arts Council. He had put his artworks on view after six years. The intervening period, the critic added, had increased his understanding of the poetical world around him.

Published in Dawn, September 14th, 2020