Karachi, one of the worlds largest cities, an ethnic melting pot and this countrys economic backbone, has also become one of the most dangerous metropolises on the planet. The rise of violent crimes, vandalism, extortion and increasingly frequent closure of business and commercial activities are all alarming for citizens of this city.
But, a look at crime statistics maintained by the Citizens Police Liaison Committee highlights just how stark this rise has been in recent years.
Murders that are assumed to be linked to political rivalries are generally dubbed arget killings and usually receive more media attention than other fatalities in Karachi. But a close assessment of data on deaths due to violent crime shows that the violence is pervasive and not limited to political activists.
In effect, the rising annual death tolls are predominantly made up of victims without known political allegiances, according to the Centre for Research and Security Studies. The report titled, "Karachi: The State of Crimes" pointed out that the number of non-political persons falling victim to target killers far exceeded those with known party allegiances.
To add to the long-standing ethnic and sectarian fault lines, groups of minorities that had erstwhile avoided the mayhem, are also now in the cross hairs of terrorists. Extremism Watch by Jinnah Institute reported grenade attacks on two congregations of Ismailis in Karachi on August 14.
Perhaps the most alarming aspect is that despite the mounting death toll, not a single target killer has been sentenced for this crime to date. Police, government officials and judiciary appear to be passing the blame among each other citing inadequate law enforcement, poor investigations, lack of political will and tedious judicial system.
The story is much the same when considering other serious crimes, such as snatching and theft of automotives. The surging tally for vehicle theft and snatching is easily comprehensible given the context of falling proportion of recoveries by police.
According to an Al Jazeera report published in March this year, Karachi is the deadliest city among the largest metropolises of the world. It highlighted that the murder rate of "12.3 per 100,000 residents" is so high that the other mega cities do not even "come within 25 percent of Karachis murder rate".
If the alarm bells are not already ringing at the Sindh Home Ministry, Federal Interior Ministry and Sindh Police headquarters, one shudders to fathom what would shake their stupor.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.