Pakistan census: Recordings from three cities
By Qaseem Saeed
It took several knocks before the door opened and a young boy emerged. While at first groggy, he quickly snapped into attentiveness on noticing an army officer standing at the doorway, cradling a G3 rifle.
It isn’t unusual at Bara Market, in central Karachi, for uniformed men to show up outside people’s homes looking for criminals. The area has seen its fair share of police raids after the paramilitary operation began in the city. The boy let out a sigh of relief when a woman, in a green jacket, edged her way forward to announce, “We are here for the population census.”
Karachi is often referred to as the largest city in Pakistan. By unofficial estimates, it is a city of 20 million. But that is only an estimate. No one knows for sure how big it is, since the last census was conducted 19 years ago.
“This is a very unique experience for our children,” says an old woman, holding her granddaughter’s hand, “I remember the national census, but now so will my grandchildren.”
For the headcount, Karachi has been divided into 14,552 blocks, or geographical units. Each census block will comprise of 175 to 250 houses. More than 11,000 civilians have been hired to move door to door, from 8 am to 4 pm, shadowed by 30,000 army officers.
Pakistan was stalling on holding the decennial census, until last year the Supreme Court directed it to announce a schedule. There wasn’t much time to train the staff or to get the paper work done, yet, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, tasked to carry out the headcount, insists it is prepared and equipped for the monumental undertaking.
Others aren’t too sure. Concerns are surfacing about the way the data is being recorded.
“The staff are using pencils to fill out forms,” explains a resident, who made a video recording of enumerators using lead pencils rather than pens, “This makes the data vulnerable to tampering later.”
Outraged, leaders of the Karachi-based Muttahida Qaumi Movement have already written letters of complaints to the PBS office in Islamabad. In response, the Bureau has issued new instructions prohibiting field officers from using pencils.
Then there are complaints from the city’s transgender people. A large community lives in the Moosa Colony of Karachi. Most of them have identity cards that list them as male.
“As per my CNIC card, I am Faisal, but in my community I am known as Farzana,” a member of the transgender community tells Geo. TV. “I can’t have the gender on my ID card changed overnight. So, for now, I will be forced to register myself as male in the census form.”
There are many others like Farzana who will not be able to identify themselves as a third gender.
Islamabad will use the census data to apportion seats in the parliament, allocate funds to provinces and districts, and to redraw lines of legislative districts. The residents of Karachi are concerned that the technical hiccups could put the crucial data at risk of inaccuracies.
Underestimating Lahore?
By Ummay-e-Farwah
Lahore may have grown larger than expected.
One indication of this came as Pakistan began its sixth population census. Over the weekend, city officials scrambled to hire additional enumerators, bringing the total to 6,000, up from 4,857.
More hands were needed after each geographical unit, a census block in the city, comprised of over 900 houses—much higher than anticipated. The Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS), has identified a total of 6,746 blocks and 867 circles in Lahore.
The last time Pakistan conducted a census, in 1998, Lahore recorded a population of upward to 6 million.
While new enumerators have been hired, the PBS will not be requesting the deployment of additional military personnel. This could mean that some civilian officers will go out into the field unaccompanied. Furthermore, the budget for the city would also have to be revised as each enumerator takes home a salary of Rs.39, 000 for the month-long task.
Pakistan’s long-awaited census may be the largest mobilisation of a civilian workforce. Islamabad has deployed a team of 119,000 people, including enumerators, with an additional 200,000 army personnel.
In the first phase, enumerators have been moving door to door, chalking each house with a number and recording basic data such as the identity card number of the head of each household. Additional details will be collected in the second phase of the undertaking.
Those recording the information have been instructed to scribble on the back of each printed form; code 3 for transgender people, 4 and 5 for the disabled, and 6 for disabled transgender persons.
Once collected, the data will be handed over to the army personnel shadowing each civilian staff for safekeeping. The final tally will then be forwarded to the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics in Islamabad for an electronic record.
Counting refugees in Peshawar
By Aftab Ahmad
When it comes to the population census, Peshawar is unique.
Unlike other cities, it has a large refugee population, most of whom are from neighbouring Afghanistan. It also hosts the internal displaced persons (IDPs) who fled Pakistan’s tribal areas to settle, temporarily, in the city.
There are no separate boxes for refugees or the IDPs in the printed forms. And that is a big problem.
“The forms were printed in 2008,” admits Akhtar Ali Khan, the Deputy Commissioner of the Department of Statistics, “therefore they do not include boxes for these people.”
Yet, Khan insists that the refugees, both registered and unregistered, are being counted separately and will be included in the final headcount.
There are an estimated 1.23 million registered and 600,000 unregistered Afghan refugees in Pakistan. Officials of the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics told Geo.TV that they are also acquiring data related to the Afghan refugees from the UNHCR.
According to a field officer working in the Gulbahar area of Peshawar, the Afghans have been cooperative during the exercise and are providing all the required data.
Peshawar, like the rest of Pakistan, is also recovering from a wave of terrorist attacks. Here, four security personnel in the urban areas and five in the rural are accompanying each enumerator.
A total of 1,450 civilian field officers have been deployed to collect data from the demarcated 2,334 blocks and 237 circles in the city.
As the census exercise enters its fifth day, other complaints from the city are coming from residents, who say enumerators are missing their homes.
“There is nothing to worry about,” explains Syed ur Rehman, the assistant commissioner of the statistics department.
“Every team has to visit two blocks of 500 houses each. All the households that have not been accounted for will be included in the next phase, which is to begin March 31.”
https://www.geo.tv/latest/134999-Pakistan-census-Recordings-from-three-cities
