And here we go again. The Sindh government’s outrageous ban on pillion riding is back for an indefinite period to add to the vicissitudes of the middle-class population of the city.
The pretext this time is the probability of terrorist attacks during Muharram in Karachi.
Apparently, the current provincial government believes that banning pillion riding is the best way to deal with the increasing crime rate, when everything else fails to work.
It first imposed the ban in 2008, lifting it after two years. From then onwards, there has been a series of re-imposing and re-lifting the ban, depending on the tumultuousness of the city.
The province’s managers, gifted with some kind of ‘divine wisdom’, use this favourite tactic of theirs time and again for some reason or another that is beyond the comprehension of ‘lesser beings’ with ‘limited knowledge’.
Experience has shown that the ban makes no difference when it comes to stopping target killers as they unleash hell in the city or controlling rampant street crimes. And as for terrorist attacks, recent cases suggest that the people involved in them might prefer using a van than a motorcycle.
In January this year, hundreds of ordinary citizens were put behind bars for pillion riding while targets killers went about their business with impunity.
Pillion riding is the middleclass’ way of dealing with increasing public transport fares while living in an expanding megacity. But when the government continues making this bad decision over and over again, there are only two beneficiary parties – greedy cops and public transport owners. Policemen get yet another opportunity to prey on citizens while public transport owners make double the profits.
It is the public that is made to suffer for the incompetence of the law enforcers, while the latter get all the ‘praise’ for their ‘efforts’.