When I travel abroad, I often meet emigrants who are eager to share their memories of Karachi. There are conversations soaked in nostalgia. They miss the city they have left behind. And because Karachi is my home, where I have lived almost my entire life, I very much enjoy these encounters.
But I was not intending to write about the Karachi that lives in the imagination of those who had lived long years of their lives here before finding their new homes in distant lands. Actually, I have returned this week after a three-week sojourn in southern California with our daughter and was all set to share some of my experiences. Karachi, however, has rudely intervened and I am distracted.
Incidentally, I was in San Francisco four days before I boarded my homeward flight from LA and there was something different in the city that I have known quite well. It really made me think of Karachi and the chaotic scenes we witness on its roads.
Well, I saw quite a few driverless taxis on the roads. It seemed such a matter of routine that there was no particular buzz around them on street corners. Yet, for me, it was a magical sight. As I said, I would not go on about it because I am back in Karachi, where a terrifying human tragedy has overwhelmed my senses. I cannot set it aside as the main point in my column.
What is noteworthy here is not just the news that there was an open manhole and a child fell in it and died. Yes, that in itself would be cause for concern and a human tragedy to touch our hearts. But the circumstances in which the tragedy of this week has unfolded are exceptional. The CCTV footage of the incident that emerged later is heartrending. I have been through the agonising experience of watching it and have felt the incredulity of what actually happened.
There are reasons why the death of a three-year-old boy after falling in an open manhole has shaken the administration, local as well as provincial. That this response was somewhat delayed does call for some explanation. Still, the incident has generated a lot of attention and debate and the media coverage has sought to reflect the rage and the grief of the people at large.
As I have said, the death of little Ibrahim Nabil has its unique features. First, consider the fact that the incident happened not in a desolate place but in the well-lit and rather busy pavement outside a big department store in Gulshan-e-Iqbal. It happened in the presence of the child’s parents and some other people. Ibrahim fell into the manhole and was literally swallowed by it because he could not be immediately rescued from the drain below and was swept away. His body was found in a drain around fifteen hours later, in a place situated very far from the manhole.
I have tried to sum it up, but the details of the episode are complex and not easy to comprehend. Many questions ought to be raised. Apparently, the massive BRT construction activity along University Road, which has played havoc with traffic on a vital thoroughfare, had complicated matters. But this also ensured that heavy machinery was at hand.
There is little clarity about how the rescue operation was conducted after the people on the site raised an alarm. Naturally, though, different agencies were set into motion and a lot of digging was done along the drain that had water flowing. A large number of operatives must have been involved in this activity.
But look at the irony of it that Ibrahim’s body was discovered by a teenage boy in the open drain near Sir Syed University. This is how the operation that had continued through the night ended on Monday. The boy, said to have been a ‘scavenger’, though this has been disputed by some, was invited to the office of a high police official, and a bouquet was presented to him. This was naturally a photo op for the media.
Actually, the story of manholes without covers is an old story in Karachi, as it should be in some other South Asian cities. Usually, manhole covers are stolen by drug addicts and the municipal staff has a task to keep a check on them. I remember doing open manhole stories as a young journalist about fifty years ago.
(As an aside, I remember noticing large iron manhole covers in Manhattan in New York that were made in India by Tata.)
On Wednesday, Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah suspended five officials, including the assistant commissioner of the area, for their alleged negligence. This action was taken in the wake of the KMC and BRT (Red Line) officials’ denials of responsibility after trading allegations of negligence. Also on Wednesday, Mayor Murtaza Wahab visited the deceased child’s family to seek ‘forgiveness’. He took responsibility for the death of Ibrahim and said he would not indulge in any blame game.
One aspect of this open manhole tragedy was the immediate protest by the local community. On Sunday night, after Ibrahim was lost in the drain, a mob blocked the traffic on the University Road and the nearby overpass for some hours. This is how the mob reacts when a serious accident takes place. In many ways, it is an expression of the helplessness of the people. How should they have behaved as responsible citizens?
More widespread has been the anger and a sense of outrage across civil society. A district court issued notices to the mayor, the head of the Karachi Water and Sewerage Corporation and a number of other individuals on an application seeking the registration of a case against them. Social media is flooded with angry comments.
Whatever this tragedy may tell us about the prevailing state of affairs in Karachi, its citizens have no option but to plough through a dangerous path that may also have an open manhole.
The writer is a senior journalist. He can be reached at: [email protected]
