KARACHI, March 30: Younger generation of the fishermen community living in the coastal villages of Hawkesbay in Keamari Town has been put at the mercy of corrupt officials, mainly of the education, health and environmental departments, as the villagers are denied all basic facilities and essentials of life, according to a survey conducted by the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum. The children in these poorly managed villages have a cheerless and aimless life, it observed.

It pointed out that in Gabo Pat union council alone, 28 of the 40 government schools had been lying closed for several years for want of teachers.

“It is gathered that the education officials concerned visit the area frequently but submit fake reports to their supervisors,” the survey said, adding that due to the absence of any monitoring mechanism, high-ups could not ascertain the factual position and take appropriate action.

There are 104 villages in the Gabo Pat union council and most of them did not have proper road communication system.

Transport is a major problem for the inhabitants of these villages.

The survey claims that the local government institutions also did not have accurate figures about the children enrolled in the schools. The LG officials concerned did not know why such a large number of schools were not being made functional.

“We are very much concerned over the situation and going to raise the issue of social corruption among the officials who are ruining the future of the entire generation by submitting fake reports,” PFF spokesman Sami Memon said.

He said the survey was based on an extensive physical study of the coastal areas during which views of community members were collected. A report in this regard would be submitted to the government, he added.

Mr Memon said that a bleak future of the young generation was cause for serious concern among community members, who had frequently been approaching the elected representatives of the area with request for basic facilities.

“However, Pakistan People’s Party legislators are paying no heed to their grievances,” he alleged.

The PFF spokesman, quoting an education department supervisor, said teachers could not attend to their respective schools because of the unavailability of transport facility. However, they had been drawing their salaries for years, he claimed.

An education department official informed PFF that the Government Middle School, Haji Ahmed Brohi Goth, had been built in 1994 but could not be made functional for want of teaching and other staff, Mr Memon said.

Similarly, he added, 20 government dispensaries of a total of 47 existing in the coastal villages were at present lying nonfunctional.

These basic health units were set up some 30 years back but stopped functioning after a few years because the staff was facing transport problem in reaching their assigned dispensaries, he said.

The PFF spokesman said that there were only three buses plying on the route leading to various villages but they left for city areas in the morning and returned in the evening. However, these timings did not suit the education and health employees but none of the two departments had ever tried to make some arrangements in this regard.

The BHUs are located in Deh Allah Bano, Haji Ahmed Brohi Goth, Mubarak Village, Abdul Rehman Goth, etc. There is a lone maternity home meant for many villages but it has also been lying closed for long, according to the survey.

Villagers are unable to have their children vaccinated against fatal diseases, it says, quoting some of them as saying that they had never seen a vaccination team visiting their villages since 1994.

Similarly, the survey says, the mangroves forests along the coastal belt are removed and sewage of the entire area is being disposed of into the sea, making the villages and their inhabitants vulnerable to natural calamities and all sorts of hazards.