At school for deaf and blind, students with special needs struggle for a basic one, water

Ida Rieu School has been facing water shortages for two years due to a fault in the mainline.

KARACHI: “Every morning, blind and deaf students cry at me, demanding water for their showers which now seem to be increasingly infrequent now at our school,” said Haleema, a domestic staffer at the Ida Rieu School for the Blind and Deaf. “Screams come out from their hostel rooms and they knock on the doors while getting ready for their classes.”

For two years now, the school, located near the Mazaar-e-Quaid, has been functioning depleted supplies of water.

Named after Lady Ida Augusta Rieu, who devoted her life to social welfare, chiefly among the poor, the school is financed by donors and philanthropists. It is affiliated with Karachi University and offers pre-primary to graduate level education. In addition to the usual subjects, the school for the hearing and visually impaired also teaches its deaf students how to use computer technology known as the Linux Operating System. There are about 1,000 students enrolled at the school and of them, 80 girls and boys live in the school’s hostels.

Despite all the institution’s good work, the students living at the school have been dealing with a shortage of water ever since a fault developed in the institute’s water mainline. The students complain that, despite multiple complaints, town officials are not bothering to address their problem. The students have appealed to the chief minister and governor as well as other government officials.

The school’s principal, Qudsia Khan, told The Express Tribune that the problem has persisted for the last two years and they have been relying on water tankers since then. Now, even the KPT and other people have stopped sending them tankers which means the amount of water is barely enough for the kitchens.

She explained that when the problem arose, they wrote to water hydrants run by different people and used to get two water tankers a week from hydrants near Guru Mandir. But since the hydrants were taken away from the Rangers, the supply has stopped.

“The area falls in Jamshed Town and we have written to the town administration and other officials but to no avail,” she said. Once it appeared that the administrator was not going to step up, the school installed a waterline that cost them Rs40,000. Once the line was completed, however, it was pulled up the next day by unidentified people.

Jamshed Town Administrator Aqeel Tanzeem Naqvi admitted that the water supply was stopped because of a major fault in the lines. He however claimed that the line has been restored and the water supply to schools has been released. “There has been a water shortage in all of Karachi,” he told The Express Tribune. “We provide them with water as per their share, however, sometimes load-shedding creates problems.”

Sohail Asim, an 18-year-old blind first-year student, lives in the Infaq House Boys Hostel. He claims that getting ready for class in the morning becomes very difficult when the taps are dry. “Besides, there is severe stench in the toilets due to the scarcity of water that prevents people from entering them,” he added.

The shortage means that even when it comes to drinking water, the students have to wait. “We have to wait for hours to get sweet water for drinking,” said Rubab, 23, a blind girl who recently completed her Master’s from the school and lives in the Sarah Mujahid Girls Hostel. “We are told to wait for the water tanker to come and then we will get potable water.”

When the long-awaited tankers arrive, their water’s murkiness leads Hanif Ahmed, 17, to worry if he can use it for ablution before prayers. “I have become tired checking the water taps,” he said. “But whenever it comes, the quality seems very poor because it is being transported here through tankers.”

Sajida Parveen, a 50-year-old domestic worker, has been at the school for 10 years. She is struggling to pacify the disgruntled students. “They don’t know I can’t get the water for them,  but it is difficult to convince them.”

Published in The Express Tribune, October 28^th, 2011.