Dead playing host to the living

KARACHI: “We reached Karachi Friday morning, but there are no basic facilities at this camp,” said Hajan Khaskhel, who hails from Islampur Mullah in Thatta and arrived in a truck. He said that the government school in Ibrahim Hyderi, where he and his brothers are currently living, has neither water nor toilets.

According to Khaskhel, around 500 people have been accommodated at this school. He said that he had initially made his way to Makli, but was forced to come to Karachi as the necropolis was already packed with hundreds of people, who were camping in the area.

Following breaches near the Faqir Jo Goth and Chhatto Chand embankments in Thatta, the government issued a warning to the city’s 300,000 residents Thursday night, asking them to evacuate. However, instead of making their way to Karachi like many others, thousands of people from Thatta made their way to Makli to set up camps at the 912-acre world heritage site.

“Although around 4,000 people arrived in Karachi on Friday, the numbers are less compared to what were being expected,” Bin Qasim Town DDO revenue Aslam Khoso told The Express Tribune. He said the town administration had set up camps at the Ghagar Phattak to house IDPs, but many people from Thatta, Sijawal and Jati have decided to camp at Makli.

Facilities for IDPs in Karachi

According to Khoso, a camp has been established in the Gadap City public school, where 570 people have been accommodated.  Similarly, 150 people are camping in the Karachi Transport Department building in SITE, and 500 are living in schools in Ibrahim Hyderi. Some warehouses belonging to the Trading Corporation of Pakistan near Pipri have also been converted into camps, Khoso added.

The revenue department has arranged for 200 buses while the police department has 250 buses that are being used to transport people from Thatta to Karachi, the DDO said. However, he added that most people are not willing to live at camps, wishing to either stay with relatives in Karachi or get their own places.

Nawaz Khoso was one of the many who initially did not wish to move to Karachi. The English literature lecturer at the Jacobabad college deemed himself lucky when he was able to move out of Jacobabad following a warning issued by the government to evacuate the area.

He packed up his valuables, gathered his family and went to Thatta to live at a friend’s place. Khoso was sure that his decision was sound and that the timely move had saved him further headaches regarding evacuations. Unfortunately, Khoso was wrong and the nightmare began all over again when the government issued orders to evacuate the city.

“I think that the water is following us. Initially, I had felt that Thatta will be safe for my family. But the water has now reached here as well. Now I am going to Karachi,” he told The Express Tribune.

The National Highway was packed with vehicles as people have started making their way from Thatta to Karachi. Meanwhile, the government has set up a camp near the Ghagar Phattak to register the flood survivors making their way into the city that has opened its doors to the internally displaced persons (IDPs). However, as the number of IDPs continues to rise, so do the problems regarding the ability to facilitate them.

“Most of our relatives have moved to Hyderabad and Badin, but we came to Karachi early Friday morning,” said Mohammad Ali Mallah, a resident Makhdom Muhallah, who was forced to hire a van for Rs8,000 to travel the distance.

At the end of the journey, Mallah says that he is not happy. “The school where we are staying was a garbage dump when we arrived,” he said, adding that even though they had cleared it of garbage, the school is still a far sight away from being fit for habitation. “Even the fans are out of order,” he said, all the while blaming the Thatta administration for the hurried evacuation notice.

“Earlier, the DCO and other officials in Thatta were saying that there is no threat to the area. We fail to understand why a breach has occurred so suddenly. Our relatives in Chhatto Chand Goth told us that they have seen some officials breaking the embankment,” Mallah claimed.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 28^th, 2010.