Rising street crimes

Underestimated figures as most victims avoid reporting to the police because of hassles

The overall law and order in Karachi has seen much improvement when compared with the situation in the recent past. There is still one area where the authorities need to be more focused. Lately, there has been an alarming spike in street crimes in the city. Robbers shot dead a female university student early in the morning on Oct 3 in Gulshan-e-Iqbal while she was waiting for her university bus. She was travelling in a car to the bus stop when a group of robbers intercepted the car.

In September, robbers killed four people upon resistance among thousands of incidents of street crimes: an army soldier, a Rangers official, and two civilians. A shopkeeper of Electronics Market in Saddar was shot dead by unidentified assailants near Radio Pakistan. In August, a male doctor and a lady doctor had been shot dead in apparently targeted attacks within the span of four days. The lady doctor, a Canadian national, was visiting the city to attend a wedding. In September, more than 30 people were wounded while offering resistance to robbers. Around 13,000 mobile phones were snatched at gunpoint. This could be an underestimate as most victims of such crimes avoid reporting to the police because of hassles.

Talking to a delegation of businessman the other day, the IG Sindh attributed the rise in street crimes to growing unemployment and asked the business community to create more jobs to help arrest the increasing rate of crimes. He is correct, but not entirely. Also, there are press reports that a young married woman was raped by four men in her home in broad daylight in the city in the last week of September. Two of the alleged rapists are reportedly serving policemen. Politicians are now in the habit of shrugging off important issues concerning the common man. They usually say things will improve with time. Like mobile phones came into being with time.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 5^th, 2019.

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