KARACHI: It was rush time around the shopping malls on Tariq Road. There were women checking out the stitched suits hanging by the roadside. Traffic was bad as motorists eyed parking spaces. The guard at the entrance of one of the biggest malls, the Dolmen Mall, was busy checking the temperature of shoppers with his infrared thermometer before allowing them in. Anyone trying to enter without a mask was turned away.

Amid the pedestrians checking out the shops through display windows, there were also several peddlers with boxes of disposable masks. A few shoppers made a beeline for them before entering the mall. Upon entering some also used the sanitizer being offered for free there. But no one was asked for their vaccination certificate.

One shopper questioned this. “There are too many people here. We can only manage taking temperatures. Checking out their vaccination certificates is going to take too much time,” the guard explained as he got back to his work.

But at the same time, people were being turned away from the Dolmen Mall in Clifton for not carrying their vaccination certificates. “We are not allowing anyone without a certificate. Rules are rules,” announced the woman at the entrance of the mall as she was shown what she was asking to see. But then one customer after showing her own certificate entered the mall with a friend, simply saying that he was with her. That friend was never asked to produce his certificate and ushered in after just getting his temperature checked.

At many places, visitors are not being asked about proof of vaccination

At the Ocean Mall’s entrance, the guard when asked by a shopper if he would like to see the vaccination card, only shook his head. “No, thank you Madam. We are not checking vaccination cards here,” he said with a smile. When asked why not, he said that the management has told him not to check for the cards because then they get fewer customers that way.

What to say of vaccination cards, although they have stickers on glass doors with the in-your-face message ‘No mask, no service’, many smaller shops and stores around the city, are themselves not observing this rule. Some have their masks hanging around their chins, some have pulled them down under their noses and for some their masks are lying around somewhere near their cash registers.

Apologetic attitude

You are asked to pull up at the entrance of all the city hotels for checking. They make you open your car bonnet and trunk, they pass mirrors under your car, there is a cute doggy sniffing inside your car also but are they not so careful about their guests? At the Marriott, though they asked politely if the people coming in are carrying their vaccination cards on them, they say they tried not to push it. “You see, some people mind it a lot if we inquire, especially those who are regular or repeated guests,” said one guard, who seemed more interested in checking the screen of the baggage scanner through which a guest had just passed her handbag.

She reminded him that she was not a regular or a repeat guest so wouldn’t he like to see her vaccination card and he smiled sheepishly. “Ma’am, you asked before I could ask you,” he said. “Besides, I could tell from your face that you are vaccinated,” he added.

But then after realising how strange that sounded, he said. “Look, we get snapped at for asking though we do ask. Some people say that we had already checked their cards earlier or before, so we say fine and allow them to go inside. We are not here to bother people. We are here to facilitate their entry,” he said.

At the Pearl Continental Hotel, too, one was allowed to enter after getting her bag checked at the baggage scanner. The lady there was then asked if they checked guests for their vaccination cards. “Oh are you vaccinated? Do you have your card or certificate on you?” She asked then.

When inquired why she had not asked for it in the first instance, she said that she only did when reminded. “You reminded me so am asking you for it. But really, it is not part of my job description. Our supervising officer is supposed to be doing that,” she pointed out.

And where was the supervising officer? “He has left for home now,” she shrugged, before averting her eyes, trying to get herself busy with the other guests.

At Avari Towers, the elderly guard, after letting you pick up your bag from the scanner, pointed towards a standee with the SOPs listed. “You are not one of the guests who have a room here, are you? Please can you show me your vaccination cards,” he asked politely. “It’s a government order. I need to check for it,” he added.

When asked what happened if we were guests staying at the hotel, he said that all guests are checked for it at the counters from where they book rooms as it can be checked easily through their computerised national identity cards.

Embassy Inn on main Sharea Faisal, too, said that all guests can be checked for having being vaccinated thanks to their CNICs which can be checked through Nadra database.

“We are not holding programmes here these days. Otherwise we would be checking everyone at the entrance. But all our staying guests are cleared by me personally by sending their CNIC numbers to Nadra. Just this morning we turned away a couple of guests who were not vaccinated,” the manager at the counter said.

Published in Dawn, October 5th, 2021