Looking deeper into the Karachi heatwave
Since an overwhelming majority of those who died were poor, nobody is calling for a probe or a rethink on how the city is growing
When I go to buy my drinking water, I don’t ask for water. I ask for Nestle. Then I drive home with five 20-litre plastic bottles and make sure that we make every cup of tea, and all our ice, from this water. Like other people in Karachi, I believe the tap water is poisonous. During the summer, many of us follow the practice of putting out a water cooler on the street for passers-by. There are chic restaurants, cafes and art galleries in my neighbourhood, but not a single public source of clean drinking water. Street vendors, security guards, trash pickers and maids rushing from one job to another often stop by to have a drink from this cooler. Like most such water coolers, mine is secured with a padlock; even the plastic tumbler is tied to it with a small chain.
When Ramadan started, like everyone else, I stopped putting out the water cooler. I did think about the people who would not be fasting and the non-Muslims not obliged to fast. But I did not think much. I removed the cooler because everyone does. There is the Respect of Ramadan Ordinance, which says you may be sent to prison for a few months if you eat or drink during fasting hours, or if you give someone something to eat or drink. I don’t really think I removed the cooler for fear of the ordinance: God knows, like every middle-class, privileged Pakistani, I flout enough laws. I did it because it would hurt the sensibility of those who fast.
Many of the nearly 1,000 people who have died in the recent heatwave in Karachi died because of this sensibility: Some people were reluctant to ask for water, others were reluctant to offer it to them. You cannot blame them. Even if they could get past their inhibitions, there was no water to be had. All the little tea stalls, roadside restaurants, small juice or snack vendors disappear from the streets during fasting hours. During this month, you can walk miles without finding a sip of water. And Karachi has developed in a way that you can also walk miles without finding any shade to cool down. Trees have been cut down to widen roads, overpasses have gobbled up footpaths; there are few shaded bus stops. Without water and without shade, while fasting, people going to and coming back from work just fell on the streets and died.
Karachi is known for killing its residents, but weather had never been its weapon of choice. It is the world’s third-largest city and its population has nearly doubled in the last 15 years, to 20 million. People go there to survive even though they know it can be a dangerous place. They leave bombed-out villages in the tribal north or parched hamlets in South Punjab to settle down at the edge of sewers in unplanned slums and make a living, mostly in daily wages, building malls or guarding them. Karachi hosts refugees from countries as diverse as Afghanistan and Myanmar. One reason so many have flocked to the city is that the weather has always been hospitable. You can sleep on the streets year round. Winter is only a rumour. Summer is hot and humid, but usually bearable out in the open with the breeze from the Arabian Sea.
No respite
The highest recorded temperature during the current heatwave in Karachi was 45 degrees Celsius. Other towns in Pakistan have recorded temperatures of 50 degrees Celsius, without ever suffering the kind of catastrophe that struck in Karachi. The victims, mostly poor and working class, needed some shade, a drink of water and a bit of time to slow down. But shade and a respite from work are hard to come by in Karachi — even during Ramadan, the work of being a megacity must go on.
Thousands of construction workers dangle from high-rises. Traffic constables stand on city squares. Private security guards sit outside banks and offices. All in the heat, with no shade. When it is not Ramadan, these workers usually carry a bottle of water. When it is Ramadan, they do not. When it is Ramadan, the eateries where they could score a free drink are shut. And when it is Ramadan, all the kind-hearted people take away their coolers.
Since an overwhelming majority of those who died were poor, nobody is calling for an investigation or rethinking on how the city is growing. The victims were just dehydrated and not sensible enough to protect themselves against the harsh weather. They do not count as martyrs, according to religious authorities, even though they died during Ramadan, many of them while fasting. The media expresses indignation, but over power breakdowns: The assumption being that with enough electricity these people would not have left their air-conditioned rooms and would have had chilled water to drink. Just as we kind-hearted people do.
But it really was not the lack of electricity or even the heat that killed these 1,000 people. What killed them was the forced piety enshrined in the law and Karachi’s contempt for the working poor. These people died because long ago, people removed any shade that could shelter them from the June sun and then took away their drinking water. Karachi’s hospitals are now awash with chilled bottles of Nestle water donated by the kind-hearted people of the city, but you still cannot get a drink of water on the streets.
Mohammad Hanif is the author of the novels A Case of Exploding Mangoes and Our Lady of Alice Bhatti.