Guest Columnist, Ardeshir Cowasjee, writing in Dawn
[Those who continue to insist that government is the problem, that less government is better (and no government best of all), might read the following piece by Ardeshir Cowasjee in order to soften their own anti-government hard line, realizing perhaps that in some instances government is absolutely necessary and essential, and that the lack of government, representing in this case law and order, permits a situation not unlike our own chaotic frontier time, with all the injustices characteristic of that period in our own history, when the ungoverned would simply grab what they wanted. But, I would add, Pakistan today is probably much worse, much more insecure, more violent, more chaotic than our own wild, wild West, now relegated for our own security to book and film.]
‘How much land does a man need?’
By Ardeshir Cowasjee
Saturday, 19 Sep, 2009, Dawn.com
Illegal construction being removed in Karachi’s Orangabad area. – APP File Photo
THIS nation [Pakistan] will remain unchanged in its deprivation and depravity until someone comes along who will ensure that we follow the first dictum of our founder and maker, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, and impose and maintain law and order.
Women and children will continue to kill each other over sacks of flour, pious men will rape three-year-old children, and the blasphemy laws will cause suffering and even murder.
A few good men are doing their best to help us get there, at least as far as the eating up by the lawless of Karachi’s open spaces is concerned. On Aug 20, 2009 I addressed the honourable chief justice of the Sindh High Court, Sarmad Jalal Osmany, requesting him to convert into a constitutional petition a letter written to him on Aug 6 by Shehri, the environmental NGO, concerning the illegal conversion and subsequent disposal of some 60 amenity plots in various areas of Karachi.
CJ Osmany was good enough to convert my letter into a petition (CP D-1998/2009). The first hearing was fixed for Sept 15, but the matter could not be taken up due to time constraints. It will be heard in the near future.
Then we have the turf war between political mafias over land in Karachi, which came to a head in July 2009 with the chief minister banning the disposal and leasing of plots by the city government. Nazim Mustafa Kamal filed a challenge in the SHC, but before the citizens could intervene on the grounds that due process was being exploited to conceal brazen encroachments on amenity spaces, the sparring duo kissed and made up and the case was withdrawn.
Four of my columns this year have been devoted to the illegal conversion, grabbing and disposal of land (including amenity plots) all over Karachi. The pillage includes parks, playgrounds, beach promenades, sewage treatment plants, government building plots, even plots in the sea (in the vicinity of the Clifton Ziauddin hospital) and planned areas around the northern bypass which are being doled out by the city government to ‘favourites’.
An anti-encroachment force formed in mid-July this year by the provincial government under the Board of Revenue to investigate and tackle the land-grabbing orgy has not yet, after the passage of two months, had its first meeting. Land-grabbing in our city, with its related violence and killings, continues unabated.
Yet another bit of positive news on the land front concerns a plot of land allotted long ago to the Horticultural Society of Pakistan for the establishment of a botanical garden, a necessity. A petition was filed in the SHC in 2005 against the cancellation of this allotment by the Sindh government. It was allowed and the cancellation was deemed to be without lawful authority. Since then there have been numerous encroachments by the CDGK upon the 30-acre plot and the society has managed to merely establish a small temporary office.
The matter of the encroachments came up in court last year (CMA 9409/2008) and this year on Aug 24 Justices Mushir Alam and Ather Saeed ordered that all the encroachments be removed within one week, observing that: ‘.. public functionaries’ duties are to protect the property of the public and not to indulge into unauthorised use and/or encroachment of the property’.
And more — Pearl Builders’ petition to protect their interests in the corroding Costa Livina skeleton which blights Bagh-i-Ibn-i-Qasim was disposed of last week by a divisional bench of the SHC which observed that the allotment of amenity plots and illegal commercial constructions thereon could not be ‘regularised’ under the Karachi Building Control Authority’s amnesty laws.
The city government advocate orally informed the court that proceedings would be initiated to cancel this allotment under law — so it would seem that, after the passing of two decades, a portion of the park will be returned to its legal owners, the people of Karachi.
Now, on to the case of Makro Habib and its superstore built on the old Grammar School Webb Ground, a playground for the deprived people of Lines Area. The petition filed by concerned citizens is now in the Supreme Court and was last heard on Sept 3 by the honourable Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Chaudhry sitting with Justices Ghulam Rabbani and Jawwad Khawaja.
After hearing the lawyers of the Military Estates Officer and Army Welfare Trust attempt to convince the bench that the playground was not an amenity plot and thus could not be used for commercial purposes, it was the turn of Makro-Habib’s counsel.
As noted the CJP in his order, ‘Mr Muhammad Akram Shaikh, learned senior ASC who attended the court yesterday, apparently hale and hearty, statedly collapsed suddenly with vertigo coupled with cellulitis after attending court in this case as is evident from the adjournment application submitted by him.’ So, the matter has been adjourned until Sept 30.
In all this, Leo Tolstoy’s short story — How Much Land Does a Man Need? — comes to mind. Russian peasant Pakhom, wishing to amass land, received a unique offer from the landowning Bashkirs. For 1000 rubles, Pakhom could walk around as large an area as was possible, starting at daybreak. If he arrived back at his starting point by sunset the entire land covered by his travels would be his. Pakhom was a greedy man, he overdid it, and as evening approached he realised his error. He frantically ran as fast as he could to get back to his starting point in time. When he got there, exhausted, he dropped dead. The Bashkirs buried him in a six-foot by three-foot plot — an ironic answer to the title question.
So much for man’s craving for land.
