Karachi looking back: The highs and lows of 2014
A year with a few highs, and quite a few lows
The Experss Tribune takes a look back at all the highs and the lows that 2014 brought to Karachi.
January 2, 2014
Eight members of three families in Niaz Mallah, a village five kilometres away from Sujawal, have been struck by a possibly fatal disease, which has already claimed lives of three children. What worries them the most is that they don’t know what causes the disease, how to cure it or what to even call it
Read the full story here.
January 5, 2014 -
First time in the country
January 10, 2014 -
Karachi's iron man has fallen
January 21, 2014 -
Anti-Polio campaign
Only one survives attack on polio team.
Read the full story here.
February 12, 2014
Eight schools run by the Village Shadabad Organisation in Johi taluka are imparting education on the rights of the body. In these schools, teachers take out two hours every week to teach minor students about sex education.
Read the full story here.
February 14, 2014 –
Razzakabad police bus attack
The doctors at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre found an application in police constable Abdul Nabi’s pocket which stated that the young officer had not received his salary for the last nine months. Over 30 other cops who were injured in the Razzakabad police bus attack had not been receiving their salaries due to ‘official issues’.
Read the full story here.
February 25, 2014 –
IDPs coming
Sindh cabinet decides to seal provincial border fearing inflow of IDPs.
Read the full story here.
February 27, 2014
NADRA begins the renewal process of proof of registration cards for refugees
Read the full story here
March 3, 2014
students in the province do not only feel on top of the world but they literally are after the announcement of the Outstanding Cambridge Learner Awards.
Read the full story here.
March 9, 2014 -
Tharparkar drought
was the death toll from malnutrition in Tharparkar on this day. The health officials denied at the time that the children were dying from malnutrition. Read the story here.
March 12, 2014 -
Targetting shoppers
When Lyari residents had learned to deal with the sounds of gunshots, Jhat Pat market attack brought a new level of fear in them. The attack claimed over 12 lives, mostly of women who were shopping for wedding clothes in the market.
Read the full story here.
March 18, 2014
April 7, 2014
April 9, 2014 -
Cup of tea
tea hotels that had shut down due to violence in the city have reopened. Read the story here.
April 9, 2014 –
First female SHO
Sindh’s first female SHO takes charge of Clifton Police Station.
Read her story here.
April 14, 2014 -
Threats to heritage: Moen jo Daro
The only Water and Soil Investigating Laboratory of Pakistan in Moen jo Daro lies idle for the last 10 years. The laboratory, which was established during the era of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, to examine the underground water and soil at the ancient site of Indus Valley Civilisation, is deprived of all basic necessities, including the latest equipment.
Read the story here.
April 19, 2014 –
Tharparkar drought worsens
is the estimated number of peacocks who had died in April as the Tharparkar drought worsened. Read the story here.
April 19, 2014
Senior journalist Hamid Mir attacked in Karachi.
Read the full story here.
April 24, 2014 –
Sindh gets new division
Sindh bifurcates Hyderabad division, craving out the sixth division of the province ‘Bhanbhor’.
Read the full story here.
April 25, 2014
May 10, 2014 -
Set a thief to catch a thief
Pakistan’s first criminology university, National University of Penal, Administrative and Security Sciences, may be illegal due to multiple irregularities in affiliation.
Read the full story here.
May 18, 2014 -
June 4, 2014 -
Matter of minutes: City panics after arrest of MQM chief Altaf Hussain in London
vehicles, including public buses and some cars, were torched by unidentified men soon after news broke that MQM chief Altaf Hussain was arrested in London, UK.
Read the full story here.
June 5, 2014 -
is the utilisation of the development budget that the Sindh government had made in health and education departments even though it claimed to have utilised around 70 per cent of its Rs185 billion development budget for the year, 2013-14.
Read the full story here.
June 10, 2014 –
July 1, 2014 -
UTP status: Money can buy happiness in jail
Karateen is where a man’s destiny – in prison – is made. This place, where inmates are stalled and ‘checked’ on their first day in jail, defines the upcoming life as a prisoner. The new inmates have to show how heavy their pockets are; the more he or she has, the more benefits they receive.
Read the full story here.
July 31, 2014
AUGUST 1, 2014 –
Risala policewoman
AUGUST 7, 2014 -
Back-to-school blues
AUGUST 8, 2014 -
Money to save Thar children spent on sofas
An anti-corruption raid at Tharparkar’s District Health Office reveals misuse of a grant worth Rs50 million from the Sindh government that was meant to be spent ‘for nutrition and therapeutic needs’. Over half of this amount – Rs26.4 million – was spent on the procurement of furniture.
Read the full story here.
AUGUST 9, 2014 -
Exposing embezzlement
is the amount the provincial tuberculosis (TB) control programme had shown as expense for the purchase of tissue papers for its programme officers.
Read the full story here.
AUGUST 10, 2014 -
Crime does pay: The lucrative business of SHO appointments
AUGUST 15, 2014 -
Tale as old as time: Property dispute older than Pakistan continues to date
per month is the rent that the tenants of Mai Bachi Compound in Lyari have been paying for the past several decades. This property has been in court over a dispute that goes back further than Pakistan.
Read the full story here.
SEPTEMBER 18, 2014
Professor Dr Muhammad Shakil Auj, the outspoken dean of Islamic Studies Faculty at the University of Karachi, was silenced by a single 9mm bullet in Gulshan-e-Iqbal.
Read the full story here.
SEPTEMBER 18, 2014 - FLOOD ‘14
Sindh heaves a sigh of relief as the floods subside in southern parts of Punjab.
Read the full story here.
All our flood updates can be found here.
OCTOBER 9, 2014 -
Black gold: The contraband that runs Karachi's wheels
Smuggled Irani oil doing roaring business in Karachi. The contraband is sold at small roadside stalls or makeshift outlets in areas where there is a huge demand for the cheaper fuel.
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 10, 2014 -
The poisoned chalice
is the number of people who died from drinking toxic moonshine liquor during the Eidul Azha holidays.
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 14, 2014 -
Karachi jailbreak averted: Terrorists' bid to tunnel into jail foiled
metres was the length of the underground tunnel that a militant group was digging into Karachi’s main prison to stage a jailbreak that could have freed up to 100 dangerous militants from outlawed groups.
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 19, 2014 -
Love for Benazir pulls women from all corners of Sindh towards Bilawal
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 20, 2014 -
Bandits seal millions from Edhi head office
OCTOBER 27, 2014 –
MQM decides to launch movement for new provinces
The Muttahida Qaumi Movement demands formation of 20 new administrative units in Pakistan, saying the new administrative divisions will rectify the problems faced by the country’s common people.
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 27, 2014 -
NOVEMBER 2, 2014 -
Anjali or Salma?
The alleged forced conversion of a Hindu girl and her subsequent marriage with a Muslim man triggers protests from her community in Sukkur.
Read the full story here.
NOVEMBER 10, 2014
NOVEMBER 11, 2014
A ‘tear’ of hope: The girl who would put the education dept to shame
At a time when thousands of able-bodied students are out of school across Sindh and hundreds of schools are serving as guesthouse for the influential, one physically impaired girl - Aansoo Kohli - stands out as a beacon of hope, having converted her cattle pen into a school that has become overcrowded with students within a few months.
Read the full story here.
NOVEMBER 19, 2014 -
#NoMoreGhosts
Facebook campaign sparks revolution in education sector. The campaign exposes hundreds of prominent figures, including journalists, political and social activists and nationalists who were drawing salaries from public schools but never bothered to attend even once.
Read the full story here.
NOVEMBER 27, 2014 –
Madressa girls found
NOVEMBER 28, 2014 -
For sniffer dogs, bombs are just one of their worries
Jenny, a Labrador, was a breeding dog whose puppies would be trained for induction into the unit as ‘operational staff’. She died of cancer.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 1, 2014 –
Ebola scare
Karachi receives its first suspected Ebola patient from Liberia.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 8, 2014 -
Under attack: Militants know how to make the police 'immobile'
is the number of police mobile vans at the disposal of Karachi’s 110 police stations. This year saw an unprecedented number of attacks on such vans as militants tried to make the law enforcers ‘immobile’.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 9, 2014 -
Operation successful
Conjoined twins separated through surgery at AKUH.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 9, 2014
Marxist leader Sobho Gianchandani dies at 95.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 12, 2014
DECEMBER 16, 2014 -
Bird's eye view
Princely Jets launch Karachi’s first helicopter ride.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 18, 2014 -
Burned out: Will someone rescue the fire department, please?
of the 22 registered fire stations do not fit the description of a fire station by far.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 29
History repeats itself
Published in The Express Tribune, December 31st, 2014.
January 2, 2014
Eight members of three families in Niaz Mallah, a village five kilometres away from Sujawal, have been struck by a possibly fatal disease, which has already claimed lives of three children. What worries them the most is that they don’t know what causes the disease, how to cure it or what to even call it
Read the full story here.
January 5, 2014 -
First time in the country
Russian marine animals make way to Karachi for country’s first dolphin show.
January 10, 2014 -
Karachi's iron man has fallen
City’s supercop Chaudhry Aslam dies in a bomb blast on Lyari Expressway
January 21, 2014 -
Anti-Polio campaign
Only one survives attack on polio team.
Read the full story here.
February 12, 2014
Eight schools run by the Village Shadabad Organisation in Johi taluka are imparting education on the rights of the body. In these schools, teachers take out two hours every week to teach minor students about sex education.
Read the full story here.
February 14, 2014 –
Razzakabad police bus attack
The doctors at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre found an application in police constable Abdul Nabi’s pocket which stated that the young officer had not received his salary for the last nine months. Over 30 other cops who were injured in the Razzakabad police bus attack had not been receiving their salaries due to ‘official issues’.
Read the full story here.
February 25, 2014 –
IDPs coming
Sindh cabinet decides to seal provincial border fearing inflow of IDPs.
Read the full story here.
February 27, 2014
NADRA begins the renewal process of proof of registration cards for refugees
Read the full story here
March 3, 2014
students in the province do not only feel on top of the world but they literally are after the announcement of the Outstanding Cambridge Learner Awards.
Read the full story here.
March 9, 2014 -
Tharparkar drought
was the death toll from malnutrition in Tharparkar on this day. The health officials denied at the time that the children were dying from malnutrition. Read the story here.
March 12, 2014 -
Targetting shoppers
When Lyari residents had learned to deal with the sounds of gunshots, Jhat Pat market attack brought a new level of fear in them. The attack claimed over 12 lives, mostly of women who were shopping for wedding clothes in the market.
Read the full story here.
March 18, 2014
Jewish trust goes to court to take back demolished Karachi synagogue land
April 7, 2014
The hunger of Thar takes 15 years of Mano Bheel’s life
April 9, 2014 -
Cup of tea
tea hotels that had shut down due to violence in the city have reopened. Read the story here.
April 9, 2014 –
First female SHO
Sindh’s first female SHO takes charge of Clifton Police Station.
Read her story here.
April 14, 2014 -
Threats to heritage: Moen jo Daro
The only Water and Soil Investigating Laboratory of Pakistan in Moen jo Daro lies idle for the last 10 years. The laboratory, which was established during the era of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, to examine the underground water and soil at the ancient site of Indus Valley Civilisation, is deprived of all basic necessities, including the latest equipment.
Read the story here.
April 19, 2014 –
Tharparkar drought worsens
is the estimated number of peacocks who had died in April as the Tharparkar drought worsened. Read the story here.
April 19, 2014
Senior journalist Hamid Mir attacked in Karachi.
Read the full story here.
April 24, 2014 –
Sindh gets new division
Sindh bifurcates Hyderabad division, craving out the sixth division of the province ‘Bhanbhor’.
Read the full story here.
April 25, 2014
The lion finally falls on the eighth attempt on his life – SHO Shafiq Tanoli targeted and killed
May 10, 2014 -
Set a thief to catch a thief
Pakistan’s first criminology university, National University of Penal, Administrative and Security Sciences, may be illegal due to multiple irregularities in affiliation.
Read the full story here.
May 18, 2014 -
Khipro villages get solar panels to charge mobile phones
June 4, 2014 -
Matter of minutes: City panics after arrest of MQM chief Altaf Hussain in London
vehicles, including public buses and some cars, were torched by unidentified men soon after news broke that MQM chief Altaf Hussain was arrested in London, UK.
Read the full story here.
June 5, 2014 -
is the utilisation of the development budget that the Sindh government had made in health and education departments even though it claimed to have utilised around 70 per cent of its Rs185 billion development budget for the year, 2013-14.
Read the full story here.
June 10, 2014 –
Karachi airport attack – a five-hour siege claims 29 lives
July 1, 2014 -
UTP status: Money can buy happiness in jail
Karateen is where a man’s destiny – in prison – is made. This place, where inmates are stalled and ‘checked’ on their first day in jail, defines the upcoming life as a prisoner. The new inmates have to show how heavy their pockets are; the more he or she has, the more benefits they receive.
Read the full story here.
July 31, 2014
Over 40 people drown at Sea View during Eid holidays
AUGUST 1, 2014 –
Risala policewoman
ASI Naseem Malik becomes the fourth woman officer to be inducted at male police stations in recent months in the city. Malik serves as a head muharrir at Risala police station. Read the full story here.
AUGUST 7, 2014 -
Back-to-school blues
400 Green Town students go to school to find rubble
AUGUST 8, 2014 -
Money to save Thar children spent on sofas
An anti-corruption raid at Tharparkar’s District Health Office reveals misuse of a grant worth Rs50 million from the Sindh government that was meant to be spent ‘for nutrition and therapeutic needs’. Over half of this amount – Rs26.4 million – was spent on the procurement of furniture.
Read the full story here.
AUGUST 9, 2014 -
Exposing embezzlement
is the amount the provincial tuberculosis (TB) control programme had shown as expense for the purchase of tissue papers for its programme officers.
Read the full story here.
AUGUST 10, 2014 -
Crime does pay: The lucrative business of SHO appointments
AUGUST 15, 2014 -
Tale as old as time: Property dispute older than Pakistan continues to date
per month is the rent that the tenants of Mai Bachi Compound in Lyari have been paying for the past several decades. This property has been in court over a dispute that goes back further than Pakistan.
Read the full story here.
SEPTEMBER 18, 2014
Professor Dr Muhammad Shakil Auj, the outspoken dean of Islamic Studies Faculty at the University of Karachi, was silenced by a single 9mm bullet in Gulshan-e-Iqbal.
Read the full story here.
SEPTEMBER 18, 2014 - FLOOD ‘14
Sindh heaves a sigh of relief as the floods subside in southern parts of Punjab.
Read the full story here.
All our flood updates can be found here.
OCTOBER 9, 2014 -
Black gold: The contraband that runs Karachi's wheels
Smuggled Irani oil doing roaring business in Karachi. The contraband is sold at small roadside stalls or makeshift outlets in areas where there is a huge demand for the cheaper fuel.
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 10, 2014 -
The poisoned chalice
is the number of people who died from drinking toxic moonshine liquor during the Eidul Azha holidays.
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 14, 2014 -
Karachi jailbreak averted: Terrorists' bid to tunnel into jail foiled
metres was the length of the underground tunnel that a militant group was digging into Karachi’s main prison to stage a jailbreak that could have freed up to 100 dangerous militants from outlawed groups.
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 19, 2014 -
Love for Benazir pulls women from all corners of Sindh towards Bilawal
Read the full story here.
Sea View opens for public
OCTOBER 20, 2014 -
Bandits seal millions from Edhi head office
Abdul Sattar Edhi robbed
OCTOBER 27, 2014 –
MQM decides to launch movement for new provinces
The Muttahida Qaumi Movement demands formation of 20 new administrative units in Pakistan, saying the new administrative divisions will rectify the problems faced by the country’s common people.
Read the full story here.
OCTOBER 27, 2014 -
Cyclone Nilofar expected to hit the city’s coast
NOVEMBER 2, 2014 -
Anjali or Salma?
The alleged forced conversion of a Hindu girl and her subsequent marriage with a Muslim man triggers protests from her community in Sukkur.
Read the full story here.
NOVEMBER 10, 2014
St Mary’s in Sukkur celebrates 125 years of education
NOVEMBER 11, 2014
A ‘tear’ of hope: The girl who would put the education dept to shame
At a time when thousands of able-bodied students are out of school across Sindh and hundreds of schools are serving as guesthouse for the influential, one physically impaired girl - Aansoo Kohli - stands out as a beacon of hope, having converted her cattle pen into a school that has become overcrowded with students within a few months.
Read the full story here.
NOVEMBER 19, 2014 -
#NoMoreGhosts
Facebook campaign sparks revolution in education sector. The campaign exposes hundreds of prominent figures, including journalists, political and social activists and nationalists who were drawing salaries from public schools but never bothered to attend even once.
Read the full story here.
NOVEMBER 27, 2014 –
Madressa girls found
Police recover 26 girls from Karachi house
NOVEMBER 28, 2014 -
For sniffer dogs, bombs are just one of their worries
Jenny, a Labrador, was a breeding dog whose puppies would be trained for induction into the unit as ‘operational staff’. She died of cancer.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 1, 2014 –
Ebola scare
Karachi receives its first suspected Ebola patient from Liberia.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 8, 2014 -
Under attack: Militants know how to make the police 'immobile'
is the number of police mobile vans at the disposal of Karachi’s 110 police stations. This year saw an unprecedented number of attacks on such vans as militants tried to make the law enforcers ‘immobile’.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 9, 2014 -
Operation successful
Conjoined twins separated through surgery at AKUH.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 9, 2014
Marxist leader Sobho Gianchandani dies at 95.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 12, 2014
PTI shuts down Karachi as part of its city-by-city shutdown
DECEMBER 16, 2014 -
Bird's eye view
Princely Jets launch Karachi’s first helicopter ride.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 18, 2014 -
Burned out: Will someone rescue the fire department, please?
of the 22 registered fire stations do not fit the description of a fire station by far.
Read the full story here.
DECEMBER 29
History repeats itself
Fire destroys 250 shops, 50 warehouses in timber market. First the fire department had no diesel, then it was water, then it was pipes, says the market association. Read the full story here.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 31st, 2014.