Complaints arise of non-cooperation in Malir, slow pace in Korangi

Official says residents are reluctant to show identity cards, share statistics

KARACHI: The census exercise was initiated in Karachi at 8am by President Mamnoon Hussain at the State Guest House. Before the census, the statistics secretary, Karachi commissioner and provincial census commissioner held a meeting with the president and briefed him about the drive.

District Malir

Census officials posted in rural parts of District Malir fear that the drive may take more time to complete, as they faced problems in dealing with people who were unwilling to cooperate with their staff.

A trade department official, Najmul Bari, assigned the Murad Memon Goth subdivision of Malir for the census, told The Express Tribune that most of the time allocated for the first day of the census to count the households went in waste.

"Some people didn't show their identity cards to the census officials visiting them and instead indulged in altercations," said Bari. "They also feared that their data would be used in another way."

The official said he attended a meeting in Zakariya Goth over a similar issue where neighbourhood notables were asked to help people understand that the identity cards were mandatory and the drive had no other objectives other than to count the number of citizens.

"This extra effort not only consumed the staffers' energy but also wasted our time in which we could have completed the household counts," he said, apprehending that if this continued, more time will be required to complete the work.

A resident of District Malir, Allah Dino, commented that most of the people did not have their Computerised National Identity Cards (CNICs), which was one reason for their behaviour with the staffers as they feared they might be considered foreign nationals.



In District Malir, the authorities have made 151 circles and 1,412 blocks for the census drive. A total of 1,747 people have been posted in the district to perform the task.

District Korangi

In District Korangi, the house listing began in the morning but both the residents and census staff had reservations.

The census staff went from house to house to inquire about CNICs and then wrote the residents' names on their forms, marking a 'sheen' in Urdu with a green marker on the house.

The house listing exercise will continue for three days but a majority of the residents complained about the teams not reaching their homes.

Anwar Ali of Bhittai Colony was among the many complainants saying that no one from the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics had arrived at his home. According to him, "It's due to their lack of training that they have not been able to cover as many houses as assigned by their seniors".



On the other hand, Aneesur Rehman, a resident of Model Colony, said he believed it was a mock exercise on Wednesday, expressing his hope that the teams would be more proactive on Thursday (today).

The assistant census commissioner of Model Town, a sub-division of District Korangi, Hafeez Shaikh said that they have been noting the problems being faced by enumerators working in the field and will try to resolve them in the coming days to ensure the exercise fulfils its purpose.

District Korangi is divided into five sub-divisions - Shah Faisal Town, Model Colony, Korangi Town, Korangi Creek Cantt and Landhi Town - with 54 charges, 351 circles and 2,253 blocks.