Daily Times

KARACHI: Sindh Bar Council on Tuesday submitted its report regarding availability of public toilets facility in eight districts of Sindh.

A division bench headed by Irfan Saadat Khan heard a petition filed by chief of the Rah-e-Raast Trust, Agha Syed Attaullah Shah, who had requested the court to declare public toilets and toilet users’ rights as essential fundamental human rights.

The court had directed Sindh Bar Council to submit report about the availability of essential facility of toilets in different districts by gathering information from its districts chapters.

On Tuesday, the SCB submitted reports of eight districts in the court. The report made shocking revelations that all the eight districts were without the facility of public toilets. The districts are Dadu, Nawabshah, Ghotki, Karachi South and Karachi West and others.

The court had directed SBC to submit reports of other districts of the province by September 12.

The petitioner had prayed the court to direct the provincial government to ensure that public toilets with required water and sanitation conditions were constructed and made functional at all public places throughout the province.

He submitted that there were no toilets for public use at police stations, TPO offices, government hospitals, schools colleges, shrines, markets, city government offices, town nazims’ offices, parks, utility stores, playgrounds, bus stops and banks in the city.

The petitioner stated that most of the existing toilets for patients in hospitals and for students in educational institutions were not functional.

The NGO chief had submitted that women and children suffer the most due to the unavailability of toilets at public places as men usually relieve themselves on isolated footpaths, under trees, in playgrounds, under bridges and in bushes, ignoring all ethical and other norms and thus causing environment pollution.

He said the indecent practice had become common in Karachi due to the indifference of the civic agencies towards the need for a decent public toilet system.

The petitioner had stated that there were 182 graveyards in Karachi. Of them, 163 are for Muslims and 19 for non-Muslims. As many as 70 graveyards fell under the control of the CDGK, while 112 others were looked after by different associations, but these graveyards were without public toilets.

The petitioner stated that there were more than 970 chowks/bus stops in the city and the CDGK (KMC) had so far rented out more than 250 bus stops for opening shops as well as for the display of commercial billboards, but no public toilet system was available at any bus stop or along a thoroughfare.

He had said there were 18 towns and 178 union councils in the city and each of them had more than one shopping centre and market without public toilets.

Published in Daily Times, August 16^th 2017.