People throng recreational places during Eid holidays

Karachiites celebrated Eidul Fitr with due solemnity and religious fervour amid special security arrangements. Taking advantage of long Eid holidays, citizens along with their families not only visited their relatives to exchange greetings, but also thronged recreational places including major city parks, water parks, seaside, and food outlets.
This year, the government had declared five Eid holidays (from Friday to Tuesday), thereby providing ample recreational opportunity to the citizens. Thousands of fun seekers, including women and children, visited Zoological Gardens, Bagh-i-Ibn-i-Qasim, Hill Park and Safari Park and a number of water parks located on National and Super Highways. At some of those places, singers and entertainers enthralled the visitors with their performance and received applause from them.
Special security arrangements were made at some of the parks. Restaurants located in many parts of the city, including Clifton, Boat Basin, Saddar, North Nazimabad, Federal B' Area, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Burnes Road were thronged with families. Moreover, heavy rush of people was also witnessed at the city's cinema houses. Meanwhile, sweet shops and bakeries did a roaring business. A number of bakeries which introduced special cakes for the occasion had also offered home delivery service.
Although the city administration had imposed ban on swimming in the city's beaches and had also deployed a number of life guards there to ward off any untoward incidents, a large number of people, including children and women, visited the beaches. However, the city's municipal organisations failed to discharge their duties as heaps of garbage which remained accumulated around several parks and main thoroughfares of the city not only presented filthy sights, but also created stinking atmosphere.
Most of the people who visited different major parks of the city complained that they were not only forced to pay more than double parking fee, but the restaurants and food outlets present within such recreational facilities charged exorbitant rates of food items which were also of inferior quality. Meanwhile, taking undue advantage of the city's poor public transport system, rickshaw and taxi drivers charged fares at their whim.