Karachi Is Now The Largest City in the World

[Ruag]

Haq's Musings is my personal blog. No body pays me for my blog. The contents in Haq's Musings are based on authentic data from widely-accepted credible sources, backed by my own personal research.

Your problem is that any data that makes India look bad or challenges your delusions about India is not acceptable to you.

From the comments I read from many Indian contributors here, it seems to me that there is no one more delusional than the Indian contributors themselves, coming from a nation with the world's largest population of illiterate, ill-fed, poor people who lack the basic sanitation facilities. And yet, they aspire to greatness without fixing the fundamental issues of poverty, hunger, illiteracy and insanitary conditions all around them.

Greatness can only come from acknowledging your problems and working to fix them, rather than deny the existence of problems like abject poverty, extreme hunger, rampant malnutrition, terrible public sanitation, ongoing major insurgencies, etc.

Haq's Musings: Food, Clothing and Shelter in India and Pakistan

Greatness can only come from acknowledging your own problems rather than poking your nose in the matter of other people.

The percentage of Pakistani population living in slums and extreme poverty without proper healthcare and other basic amenities is far greater than that of India. And yet some Pakistanis are more interested in writing stupid blogs rather than helping their fellow countrymen.

And just to point out, most of your sources lack credibility (for example, citymayors.com ) and you blatantly ignore reputed sources.

 

[RiazHaq]

Look who is talking about links!

By the way, the link you provided gave only a partial "preview" of the book. Not all pages are available. Nice try to twist facts.

I do not remember the exact page of the book, but it I clearly remember it saying that Orangi Township has 1.2 million slum dwellers compared to 800,000 in Dharavi.

Anyways, I can agree that as far as absolute numbers are concerned, Mumbai probably has more slum dwellers than Karachi. But what about the percentage of population living in slums?

Now here are some concrete sources -

According to UN Habitat, 73.6% of Pakistan's urban population lives in slums compared to 55.5% in India.

http://ww2.unhabitat.org/programmes/guo/documents/Table1.pdf

When you point this out, you ignore the following facts:

1. Pakistan is much more urbanized than India. According to the UN Habitat 2001 data you pointed to, Pakistan is 33% urban vs India's 27% urban population.

http://ww2.unhabitat.org/programmes/guo/documents/Table1.pdf

Haq's Musings: Urbanization in Pakistan Highest in South Asia

2. Slum is a catchall term for any illegal housing in any city. It does not differentiate between quality of services available to residents. As I pointed earlier, Orangi in Karachi has a lot more services than Dharavi in Mumbai. It has schools, hospitals, piped water, sewerage, etc etc.

While Dharavi has only one toilet per 1440 residents and most of its residents use Mahim Creek, a local river, for urination and defecation, Orangi has an elaborate sanitation system built by its citizens. Under Orangi Pilot Project's guidance, between 1981 and 1993 Orangi residents installed sewers serving 72,070 of 94,122 houses. To achieve this, community members spent more than US$2 million of their own money, and OPP invested about US$150,000 in research and extension of new technologies. Orangi pilot project has been admired widely for its work with urban poor.

Haq's Musings: Orangi is not Dharavi!

 

[foxbat]

Your problem is that any data that makes India look bad or challenges your delusions about India is not acceptable to you.

No sir.. Its not the data that i question, but the intent and the interpretation of that data. Term Cherry picking must have been coined with musings such as yours in mind...

From the comments I read from many Indian contributors here, it seems to me that there is no one more delusional than the Indian contributors themselves, coming from a nation with the world's largest population of illiterate, ill-fed, poor people who lack the basic sanitation facilities. And yet, they aspire to greatness without fixing the fundamental issues of poverty, hunger, illiteracy and insanitary conditions all around them.

and unlike BMC, you are so unbiased arent you. My personal research from going thru your blog tells me that you dont need to get paid for spewing such hatred. The expression of these negative feeling towards India, made easy by today's electronic media seems reward enough for you..

I dont want to stoop to your level to start bashing poverty etc in Pakistan because that will not make our problems go away but I guess doing the same for India works well you.

So all the best for your musings..

 

[Ruag]

When you point this out, you ignore the following facts:

1. Pakistan is much more urbanized than India. According to the UN Habitat 2001 data you pointed to, Pakistan is 33% urban vs India's 27% urban population.

http://ww2.unhabitat.org/programmes/guo/documents/Table1.pdf

Haq's Musings: Urbanization in Pakistan Highest in South Asia

What is the point of hiving a higher urban population (that too by 6% points!) when 75% of it is living in slums?

2. Slum is a catchall term for any illegal housing in any city. It does not differentiate between quality of services available to residents. As I pointed earlier, Orangi in Karachi has a lot more services than Dharavi in Mumbai. It has schools, hospitals, piped water, sewerage, etc etc.

While Dharavi has only one toilet per 1440 residents and most of its residents use Mahim Creek, a local river, for urination and defecation, Orangi has an elaborate sanitation system built by its citizens. Under Orangi Pilot Project's guidance, between 1981 and 1993 Orangi residents installed sewers serving 72,070 of 94,122 houses. To achieve this, community members spent more than US$2 million of their own money, and OPP invested about US$150,000 in research and extension of new technologies. Orangi pilot project has been admired widely for its work with urban poor.

Haq's Musings: Orangi is not Dharavi!

OK. Let us believe that Orangi does provide its dwellers with more basic amenities compared to the dwellers of Dharavi.

So? Does it change the fact that Karachi is ranked much below Mumbai in terms of quality of living?

http://www.eltiempo.com/colombia/bogota/ARCHIVO/ARCHIVO-5104389-0.doc

Look at the city as a whole rather than comparing certain localities.

 

[SMC]

Again, these rankings are not accurate. They always use media articles to come up with their rankings. Look at their ratings for some Saudi high class cities. Also check the ratings for Islambad and Lahore compared to Indian cities. What do you think, Lahore is better or Mumbai? Let alone Islamabad? Is there even a comparison? These rankings are my no means accurate representation of quality of life. It is perhaps the perceived quality of life from north america or europe. It is wrong to use these sources in the first place.

 

[Skywalker]

Indians are talking too much about Ornagi town being the largest slump in Asia, why not show them some pictures of Orangi Town to keep there mouth shut for ever.

I have a firm believe that this so called slump is having a far better civic facilities than their middle class areas in mumbai, where quite a few sleep on the footpaths.

I would request with any member living in Karachi to take some snap shots and paste them here.

I can guarantee that the Indian bubble would be busted forever.

 

[Skywalker]

Here you go, check the first instance.

Kindly do not take this as a MQM propaganda stunt, it can be compared with any other town in Karachi.

 

[RiazHaq]

Greatness can only come from acknowledging your own problems rather than poking your nose in the matter of other people.

The percentage of Pakistani population living in slums and extreme poverty without proper healthcare and other basic amenities is far greater than that of India. And yet some Pakistanis are more interested in writing stupid blogs rather than helping their fellow countrymen.

And just to point out, most of your sources lack credibility (for example, citymayors.com ) and you blatantly ignore reputed sources.

This is absolute nonsense!

All of the data and studies about urbanization and urban slums indicate that urban poor are much better off than their rural counterparts in terms of access to health care and education and other amenities.

When visitors see a squatter city in India or Pakistan or Bangladesh, they observe overwhelming desperation: rickety shelters, little kids working or begging, absence of sanitation, ****** water and air. However, there are many benefits of rural to urban migration for migrants' lives, including reduction in abject poverty, empowerment of women, increased access to healthcare and education and other services. Historically, cities have been driving forces in economic and social development. As centers of industry and commerce, cities have long been centers of wealth and power. They also account for a disproportionate share of national income. The World Bank estimates that in the developing world, as much as 80 percent of future economic growth will occur in towns and cities. Nor are the benefits of urbanization solely economic. Urbanization is associated with higher incomes, improved health, higher literacy, and improved quality of life. Other benefits of urban life are less tangible but no less real: access to information, diversity, creativity, and innovation.


Haq's Musings: Do South Asian Slums Offer Hope?

Along with increasing internal rural to urban migration, there has also been a wave overseas migration from urban areas in Pakistan to urban centers overseas, especially the Middle East. The Middle East, with its vast oil wealth, has provided many opportunities for overseas workers to work and earn a living building and maintaining infrastructure in various Arab states, especially in the Persian Gulf. In recent years, overseas Pakistanis have been contributing to Pakistan's economy with remittances exceeding $8 billion a year.

Haq's Musings: Urbanization in Pakistan Highest in South Asia

 

[RiazHaq]

Why are you ranting about mumbai slums?

One of your fellow Indian posters brought it up when he compared Orangi with Dharavi. I didn't. I'm simply responding to his misguided and un-informed arguments.

 

[Windjammer]

Check out the Cargo AIR Traffic arriving at Karachi Airport.


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[Trisonics]

Check out the Cargo AIR Traffic arriving at Karachi Airport.

Amazing pics. Did you take these pics? if not, can you point me to the source? The AN-12 look magnificent

 

[Windjammer]

Amazing pics. Did you take these pics? if not, can you point me to the source? The AN-12 look magnificent

The pictures were posted to me by a contact from Pakistan who most probably took them.

 

[Trisonics]

Following is a list of the top 10 most liveable cities as ranked by the Economist:

*

Vancouver, Canada

*

Vienna, Austria

*

Melbourne, Australia

*

Toronto, Canada

*

Calgary, Canada

*

Helsinki, Finland

*

Sydney, Australia

*

Perth, Australia

*

Adelaide, Australia

*

Auckland, New Zealand

The bottom 10 cities were:

*

Harare, Zimbabwe

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Dhaka, Bangladesh

*

Algiers, Algeria

*

Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea

*

Lagos, Nigeria

*

Karachi, Pakistan

*

Douala, Cameroon

*

Kathmandu, Nepal

*

Colombo, Sri Lanka

*

Dakar, Senegal

Vancouver ranked world's most liveable city

 

[punit]

The report you refer to was compiled by Mumbai's Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation with assistance from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). It claims that while Dharavi, the setting for the Oscar-winning Slumdog Millionaire movie, has 57,000 families living in overcrowded huts with poor sanitation, Orangi on the outskirts of Karachi is home to more than a million people living in poverty. This report was sponsored and paid for by Mumbai municipality

of coourse it was paid by raw to defame pakistan .....

 

[SMC]

^ Such hypocrites these bharatis are. Questioning any of their opinion is a conspiracy theory, while any opinion of Pakistanis is a conspiracy theory.

Do bharatis take reports by Pakistan on bharat seriously? So, then, get lost.