Karachi buried another child recently. A five-year-old boy, full of life, curiosity, and innocence, slipped into an open manhole near NIPA — a manhole that should never have been open in the first place, a hazard that should never exist in a city where human lives matter. His small body disappeared into darkness, but the darkness that swallowed him is nothing compared to the darkness that has already taken hold of Karachi’s civic governance.
This was not just an accident. This was the predictable, preventable, unforgivable result of a city abandoned by those responsible for running it.
For years, Karachi has been sinking — not into water or sewage, but into a deep pit of administrative abandonment. The institutions meant to protect the people in this ‘metropolitan city’ — KMC, KWSC, the Local Government Department — have become hollow names, stripped of purpose, stripped of duty. Their absence is visible on every road, every footpath, every gutter, every broken streetlight, every collapsed pavement. And now, their absence has taken another child. When to end, don’t know.
The death of this young innocent boy is not a tragedy of chance; it is the tragedy of lethargy, incompetence, ignorance, and corruption. It is the tragedy of a civic machinery that wakes only to collect salaries, perks, luxury motors, issue tenders, and protect turf — but never to protect the lives of common citizens.
Karachi, once a city of hope, enterprise, and brilliance, has been reduced to an abnormal, third-class urban jungle, where danger lurks in every pothole, every dangling wire, every unmarked ditch, and every open manhole waiting silently for another victim. The biggest city in Pakistan, contributing over half of the nation’s revenue, is being run as if human life has no worth.
And yet, the pain of this story does not end with institutional failure. Where were the shopkeepers and owners of chain stores, who walked past the open hole every day?
Where were those who could have placed a wooden plank, a brick, a chair, a tree branch, a warning — anything — to protect a passing child? Where were we, the citizens of Karachi, always ready to complain but too often unwilling to act when action is needed most?
At last but not the least, where were the parents who, in their own struggles and exhaustion, perhaps missed a moment of vigilance? In a city as hazardous as this, every parent must live with fear that the next crack in the road, the next broken pavement, or the next reckless negligence could swallow their child. Yet even the most alert parents cannot foresee hazards that have no place in a civilized society. They cannot fight a system built on indifference and rot.
But above all, where were the authorities whose only fundamental duty is to ensure public safety? Where were the supervisors? The inspectors? The sanitation teams? The officers who sign off on maintenance reports that are never followed? The administrators who drive past these hazards in tinted luxury vehicles while the city crumbles beneath them?
Karachi’s civic and government bodies have mastered the art of press statements and condolence messages, but not the art of governance. They know how to promise inquiries, but not how to repair a manhole cover. They know how to suspend a low-level worker, but not how to reform the system that keeps producing this negligence year after year.
This city is grieving, but it is also angry; angry at a governance structure that behaves as though Karachi is a disposable city; angry at officials whose apathy has turned public spaces into death traps; and angry at a system that has normalised preventable deaths.
A five-year-old child is gone, and his parents will never heal from this loss. Their home, their future, their memories — all have been shattered because someone, somewhere, simply did not do their job. That is the brutal truth.
Unless Karachi demands accountability beyond a press release, unless civic authorities are forced to serve rather than sit, unless corruption is replaced with competence; and unless we, the citizens, refuse to walk past danger as if it is normal….Then this boy will not be the last.
For the sake of every child who walks these streets, Karachi must rise. And those who allowed this tragedy — through their neglect, their laziness, their incompetence, their corruption — must answer for it.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2025
The writer is a former Director General in the Federal Government and can be reached at: [email protected]
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