The federal government moved to allay the concerns of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) regarding the census and directed the chief census commissioner to resolve its issues as soon as possible, sources said on Wednesday.
An MQM-P delegation, comprising Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, Dr Farooq Sattar, Aminul Haq and Javed Hanif, met federal ministers Khawaja Asif, Khawaja Saad Rafique and Ahsan Iqbal in Islamabad to discuss the census-related issues.
According to sources, the planning secretary, the principal secretary to the prime minister, and senior officials of the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) also participated in the meeting.
The MQM-P delegation, a major ally of the federal government, apprised the ministers of its concerns over the census. The MQM-P leaders claimed that the number of residents of Karachi was shown less than the actual population of the metropolis.
According to the sources, the ministers acknowledged MQM-P’s concerns and assured that its demands would be reviewed and its concerns would be allayed. Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal directed the chief census commissioner to redress the party’s concerns.
Also read: MQM-P decries irregularities in census process
During the meeting, the sources said, the MQM-P delegation raised its concern over the “irregularities” committed by the PBS enumerators, and the “injustice” done by the provincial government.
“The MQM has recorded its strong protest against the federal government with serious reservations over the census,” a source told The Express Tribune. “They [MQM-P] made it clear that census is a matter of survival for it and there will be no compromise on it.”
The MQM-P claimed that 2.5 million households have not been counted in Karachi, which reduces the population of the metropolis by 15 million people. They warned that the party could not accept those figures.
Besides, the sources said, the MQM-P showed evidence to the government’s team that some 32,000 buildings as well as the slum areas of Karachi had not been counted in the census so far.
The sources also said that the MQM-P emphasised that the census process should continue until the entire population was counted. It also demanded the constitution of monitoring committee for the rectification of the data.
Responding positively to the MQM-P concerns, the government agreed to hold more meetings with its ally in the future to determine how to resolve these problems in a proper way, according to the sources.
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