By Naveed Ahmad
Pakistan’s drowns in a ‘super’ flood. The worst seems yet to come. A microcosm of the same occurred along the left bank of Park Road all the way to twin Burma bridges on Friday. Hundreds of houses were flooded to knees of their inmates while dozens of cars floated like grass blades. There was no sense of alarm in the Interior Ministry, parent institution of the Capital Development Authority (CDA). A brief but vital army operation to airlift flood-stricken families from Burma Bridge unveiled the unfolding disaster but not for long. For circumstances like these, there goes a saying: when all else fails, lower your standards. The residents of Islamabad have broken all records in favor of havoc-wrecking Capital Development Authority. Since the mid 1990s, the city has withstood decline in civic services promised to maintain and flourish a model metropolis.Early Friday morning, the Mother Nature punished Islamabad’s optimistic dwellers. The heavy monsoon rain came as no surprise, given repeated forecasts and warnings by the Pakistan Meteorological Department. Characteristically, Islamabad’s hill slopes can ideally withstand heavy downpours with its scrub forests arresting land erosion.For bosses at the helm, it definitely required exceptional skills to beat the nature and create small, seasonal dams. The problem with their ‘unsung’ innovation, however, has been over crowding of the metropolis. Thanks to generous blessing of CDA’s distinguished ‘town planners’, beds of natural water channels were optimally used to accommodate never-ending urbanization.Some more-equal residents earned tacit consent of the authority to extend their lawns by landfilling the streams. Not so covertly, others built mud-shelters. The last decade proved the more profitable for the CDA.
They managed to transform the left bank of Park Road into a tribal area, dotted with posh-looking avenues and bungalows. The city’s private developers, often nicknamed as land mafia, continue to make promises and progress, not to mention swelling bank accounts.The real estate, encroached with impunity, has led to a construction boom, with plazas and mini-bungalows mushrooming at a record pace. With CDA officials on board, two such developers jealously battled with automatic arms to annex pathway of a sizeable nullah crisscrossing the COMSATS Institute of Information Technology. The befooled buyers of plots continue to pay bribes to get electricity or gas connectivity.
Invariably, the masterminds behind illegal housing avenues have backing of political parties such as PMLN, PPP, JUI-F and even PTI. The greenbelt serves as extended lawns if not the walled courtyards of the high and the mighty flanking the left bank of Rawal Road.Meeting the housing needs of various universities and colleges in the area, the CDA-blessed land developers are ripping of students in the name of quality hostel accommodation. One ‘Avenue’ supports a hoarding warning against opening a hostel without permission from the land developer. The political clout and endless promises of the land mafia, however, sank helplessly in the raging waters of the nullah. Sans proper embankment, over 100 houses in at least two such ‘avenues’ remain devastated while neither the CDA or its influential allies cared to visit the affected area. The flooding was hardly reported by the noisy television media. Even if a few tickers were run, neither the government nor the Islamabad High Court attended to the grim situation.
For Islamabad, the CDA is a bull in the China shop. Indifferent from repeated violations of its bylaws and confident to face zero public suits for damages, the bosses make merry.It’s a pity that neighboring areas of Simly and Rawal dams receive no warning when the spillways are opened and surplus water released. In face of heavy rain in Islamabad’s encatchment areas, the residents of its vulnerable areas are never alerted. Adding insult to the injury, there are little chances of financial or material compensation to the victims, mostly hailing from the middle and lower classes.Optimists believe that things may have been better had there been an elected local government in the federal capital. Since the theory was never put to test, thus it’s premature to pin hopes with it. With Lahore wearing the picture of a dam with over 15 million population, the capacity of civic institutions in Pakistan becomes even more debatable. Dr Tariq Fazal Chaudhry, MNA from NA-48 for the second term in a row, deserves some public accountability too. More frequently seen on TV talk shows than in his constituency, the man is alleged to have facilitated unplanned and illegal settlements in the area.For the inhabitants of NA-48, the only ray of hope comes from Islamabad High Court. Without a suo moto action against illegal and irregular construction activities may simply lead to major catastrophe. It’ll be too late when, God forbid, the next earthquake or floods hit the area. For a change, there may emerge a concerned citizen moving the courts against massive violations of CDA bylaws at the hands of politically aligned land mafia.
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