With the nastiest sewerage and drainage system of the city, the rain is what the Karachiites pray to get until a few years ago but for the last 5-6 years, people in this city don’t want it to rain.
We conducted a small survey where we asked if they want it to rain or not and if yes then what should be changed in the system so the city can bear heavy rain.
In the few responses, people seemed tired of the rains and worst drainage system as half of the city drowns even if it rains one hour continuous, many markets, colonies and even parked cars get drown in the rain water.
The city which spans over 3780km square have no proper drainage when it rains just a few weeks the city has no capacity to survive if it would have rained how it rains in Islamabad or Lahore.
People of this city shares how miserable they feel when it rains or how the city fails to let them enjoy the rain. When asked should it rain or not one of the readers of Daily Times responded that “I think instead of focusing on making roads and underpass, improving sewerage system should be the top priority of the government, even main Sharae Faisal becomes swimming pool due to no drainage of rainwater. We just can’t afford heavy rains no matter how much we wish for it”.
Another response to the same query was, “It is called ‘Baraan-e-Rehmat’ for a reason. It should definitely rain. However, the sewerage, drainage, and infrastructure problems should also be adequately addressed by those in power”.
One of the retorts who has shifted from Lahore to Karachi was disappointed in Karachi’s weather, she shares that, “The city’s so dry all the time, not much of greenery courtesy water being so expensive so yes for a greener system yes it should rain. Also, k-electric does a terrible job that goes without saying but with the deteriorating situation the ecosystem needs to be the priority of the hour”.
One of the residents of Karachi who shifted from KPK while sharing her disappointment in the city shared that, “Saying that it shouldn’t rain because we cannot manage rain is absurd, because turning rain in adversity is because of poor governance and poor demeanor by people as well. There are countries where nothing stops life, neither rain and nor snow, they manage it all even in freezing temperatures, so nothing should stop life”.
It has rained thrice in last three weeks in Karachi and every week the city depicts the worse conditions than before, even the nullahs of the city overflow and the sewerage water enter houses and cars of people making the situation unbearable for thousands of people.
The city is house to more than 500 nullahs with 48 big ones which come under Karachi Municipal Corporation while the rest small ones are under District Municipal Corporations.
Mayor Karachi Wasim Akhtar while talking to the Daily Times told that there is no specific budget for nullah cleaning while Sindh government released 500 million rupees in 2018 when the last time all the nullahs were cleaned. “Now the sewerage and drainage cleaning of nullahs are done by World Bank’s fund while DMC’s manage their funds on their own,” Akhtar mentioned.
The misery just doesn’t stop with rain only the private electric supply company of the city K-Electric makes it nastier with no electricity for hours and hours as soon as the first drop of rainfalls. To add to the melancholy of this unlawful city the internet and mobile services also went down all over the province when it rained yesterday.
I hope a day comes when Karachiites can actually enjoy the rain without all the basic facilities which they lack and worrying about them they can’t adore nature.