KARACHI: Despite passing more than a year, civic authorities have failed to complete the work to reconstruct a major thoroughfare in Surjani Town causing hardship and inconvenience to a large number of people who use the road on a daily basis.

Residents of Surjani Town Sector 4-C, Raheem Goth and Yousuf Goth said that the Al-Kareemi Road, which connects Khwaja Shamsuddin Azeemi Road to Kareemi Chowrangi, had remained in a dilapidated condition for more than a year, but the authorities concerned have turned a blind eye to this plight of people.

The road is in need of reconstruction as over the time it has developed potholes everywhere filled with mud and there is garbage laying here and there. It has become a constant menace for its daily commuters.

The authorities concerned started the construction work months ago, but stopped it after just a few days of slow and inefficient activities.

Al-Kareemi Road has vanished from the surface, but authorities turn a blind eye to commuters’ plight

Besides other reasons, constant leakage of water supply lines there has increased the pace of damage, due to which the road has become a mud swamp from where even passing on foot has become difficult.

Since a Green Line bus station at Kareemi Chowrangi became operational, the number of commuters on this road has increased and hundreds of people travel daily from the heavily populated surrounding sectors of Surjani Town to the station.

It has also become a cause of constant mental agony for the locals of the area, especially for those travelling to their offices in the morning and children going to schools.

Wahab Ali, a resident of the area, said: “People face a lot of troubles because of this dilapidated road, especially those going to work and schools and colleges in the morning.

“It is also because of the condition of the road that many students do not prefer to get admission in Government Degree College Surjani and those who are enrolled there do not go to attend classes.”

Another resident, Ghulam Mustafa, besides complaining about similar issues, said the condition became worse when local people threw garbage by the roadside, which emitted foul smell after mixing with water leaking out of the supply lines.

“It also often happens that vehicles get stuck in the mud and people fall from their motorbikes,” he regretted.

When Dawn asked a recently elected UC councillor as to when the construction work would begin, he said that the work would start once the UCs were formed officially.

Published in Dawn, February 13th, 2023