Homeless people scramble for survival

Most of the people habitually complaining of the harsh weather or loadshedding schedule are comfortably resting on their memory foam mattresses in their air-conditioned rooms at night. However, for the homeless people spending their nights desperately seeking shelter while escaping police crackdowns, sleep takes over before they can even think about complaining.

During the tenure of the previous elected government, Panah Gah or night shelter homes were established to help homeless people sleep safely at night. However, over the last three years, the Punjab government has shut down these facilities, as a result of which homeless people sleeping on roads and sidewalks are exposed to harsh weather conditions during the winter and summer months. In just Lahore alone, nearly 1,700 homeless people have lost their lives over the past three years.

A homeless couple, Inam and Asiya, who now sleep near Lal Pul along the canal, shared their experience. "A few years ago, we used to go to a shelter near the railway station at night where we'd get a bed and food. Then we'd go back to work the next morning. But for the last three years, the shelters have been shut. We've made a temporary place near Lal Pul. Sometimes the police hassle us, and we change our spot for a day or two. Although we can manage during the day, nights are our biggest enemy," shared the couple.

Edhi Foundation spokesperson Muhammad Younis Bhatti confirmed that the death rate among those sleeping on footpaths during the winter and summer months has significantly increased over the past three years, mainly due to the lack of shelters. "Previously, shelters provided 8 to 10 hours of rest daily, but their closure has complicated the situation. In the summer, the footpaths are searing, while in winter, the frost intensifies the cold. Hence a spike in death occurs during these three to five months," noted Bhatti.

According to sources of The Express Tribune, the highest number of unidentified deaths are reported from areas including Data Darbar, Bhati Gate, Tibbi City, Qila Gujar Singh, Muslim Town, Kahna, Shahdara, Kot Lakhpat, Lari Adda, Mozang, and Garden Town. While more than 170 permanent and temporary shelter homes were built across Punjab, including 13 in Lahore, there is now only one functional shelter home each in Multan, D.G. Khan, Taunsa Sharif, Rawalpindi, Faisalabad, Bahawalpur, and Sargodha, and just six remain operational in Lahore.

Director Social Welfare, Muzammil Yaar, revealed that more than 50 per cent of the shelter homes were initially built in collaboration with philanthropists, but over time, most of them were closed. "Even some of the shelters originally run by the Social Welfare Department have been shut down. A shelter home has a staff of over 10 people and caters to over a 100 people daily. The government has not allocated a significant budget to expand the shelter network.

As a result, in Lahore and across Punjab, the closure of shelters over the past three years has directly contributed to the rising death toll among homeless individuals, especially those exposed to harsh weather or struggling with drug addiction," conceded Yaar.

"A significant percentage of deaths reported among the homeless occur due to drug abuse, which is worsened by extreme weather. Many of these individuals become addicted simply to kill time, and in the past three years, drug abuse among them has increased by over 40 per cent," claimed Syed Zulfiqar Hussain, a drug rehabilitation consultant.

In the meanwhile, a spokesperson for the Punjab government claimed that although in the past, temporary arrangements were made for sheltering homeless people, the current government was working on a permanent solution to the problem.