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KARACHI, Sept 17: The fact that hazardous emissions from vehicles contributes greatly to alarming levels of air pollution in the city is no secret. And when one sees rickety old vehicles freely plying Karachi’s roads releasing plumes of vile black smoke, one realises that something somewhere in the system is very wrong.
According to a World Bank-sponsored study, the report of which was published in this newspaper in January 2007, the three main sources of air pollution countrywide are vehicular emissions, industrial emissions and the burning of municipal refuse. Not surprisingly, the same news-story said that vehicles led the pack by contributing a whopping 45 per cent to environmental pollution. And the situation in Karachi is particularly acute as it is the country’s largest city and economic hub.
This leads one to ask what exactly are the authorities doing to rein in the smoke-emitting vehicles. After all, there is a Motor Vehicle Inspection Branch located on the outer rim of the city in Saeedabad where commercial vehicles such as buses and trucks appear to have fitness certificates issued and renewed. But if so many polluting vehicles freely operate on the city’s roads, is the inspection branch doing its job?
When this writer visited the inspection branch, a rather pathetic situation was witnessed.
One of the police officers posted at the branch agreed to speak to Dawn on the condition of anonymity. The first thing he complained about was the fact there had been no electricity at the facility for three days.
“How can we make entries into the computers when there’s no power?” he asked.
‘Buses too old’
When asked what so many polluting vehicles were doing on the city’s roads, the police officer had a number of explanations.
“One of the major reasons behind so much vehicular pollution is the age of the vehicles. No new buses have been introduced since 1984. There were the UTS buses, but they met an early demise. Vehicles have an age limit, and if you go beyond that limit, their roadworthiness starts becoming questionable,” he said.
But if there were so many vehicles not fit to operate, why were they allowed on the road?
“We do fine polluting vehicles. We can also detain them, but as soon as the owners pay the fine, the vehicles are released. Only a DSP-level officer has the authority to cancel a fitness certificate,” the officer said.
He added that as part of the campaign to reduce vehicular pollution, the inspection branch no longer certifies two-stroke rickshaws.
When asked what facilities would help improve the performance of the Motor Vehicle Inspection Branch, the police officer claimed that the provision of proper testing equipment would help tremendously, as at present inspectors approve or reject the fitness of a vehicle through a visual process.
However when DIG Traffic Wajid Ali Durrani was contacted by Dawn, he was of the opinion that the visual inspection process is in fact quite effective.
“Even you can spot the vehicles that emit smoke when you’re on the road. The visual inspection process is quite thorough. However, to get to the nitty-gritty we are in the process of acquiring gadgets [for testing purposes] and have talked to the environment department about this,” said Mr Durrani.
The DIG traffic also claimed that efforts were under way to discourage polluting vehicles from plying the city’s roads.
But in spite of the police officials’ claims, sources claimed that corruption was rampant at the Motor Vehicle Inspection Branch. One source alleged that just outside the facility, ‘brokers’ operated in connivance with certain police officials to get approval for otherwise unfit vehicles.
‘Impure, expensive diesel to blame’
However, the transporters who operate in the city have their own tales to tell. For instance, Irshad Bokhari, President of the Karachi Transport Ittehad, a group of transporters, told Dawn that transporters simply don’t make enough money to spend on the maintenance of their vehicles.
“The main problem is that diesel costs are too high. Since 1999 there has been more than a 250 per cent increase in diesel prices, whereas fares have only increased 71 per cent. Since the costs are so high and the earning is not enough, how can we spend on the maintenance of our vehicles?” he said.
He added that the diesel available locally, especially smuggled Iranian diesel, is impure and adulterated.
The World Bank report as well as figures from the Economic Survey of Pakistan 2005-2006 seemed to corroborate Mr Bokhari’s claim about the use of impure fuel. But he was also critical of the police, alleging that “corruption” within their ranks was aggravating the problem.
“People in power do not listen to us. This is our city too. We need to be taken on board as we are stakeholders. The accusations that transporters are a mafia are false, as we do not want to hinder a good thing,” Mr Bokhari said, referring to the introduction of CNG buses in the city.
All the stakeholders – the police, transporters, city government –have their own explanations (some legitimate, others not so) as to why smoke-emitting vehicles continue to ply Karachi’s roads with impunity. But the city’s biggest stakeholders – its citizens – continue to suffer as accusations between the main players ricochet back and forth.
