On a rampage: Unchecked drug addicts, professional beggars
Aliens, seemingly materializing out of thin air, but reportedly representing an exodus from such dreary places as Narowal, Shakargarh, Vehari, and other rural backwaters, now appear to be the dominant presence in the once-enchanting cultural city of Lahore. And what a presence: a loutish loudness and abusiveness, mischief writ large in every action, dull Dravidian faces, over-oiled scalps, the same shabby clothes and unkempt appearance, speaking in strange dialects (nothing musical about them), as have seldom been heard before in the old city with such pronounced frequency and high decibel levels as they are at present.
Some of these people, frequently employed as cooks, domestic servants or office boys and similar petty vocations have lately become the kings and captains of the Lahore cart or ‘rehri’ trade, especially in the fruit business, and it is rumoured that their new found prosperity has even encouraged them to turn to money-lending to established shopkeepers and retailers as a side business.
Good luck to them in their various (legitimate) enterprises and for all the hard work and the life lived cooped up in a small room with forty other rustics far away from the relative comforts of their own homes and loved ones.
What mainly irks the ordinary Lahorite about them, apart from their perpetual rudeness, is their take-it-or-leave-it pricing mechanism, usually astronomical, and their dexterity in successfully disposing off the knowingly damaged or rotten items among their wares to the unsuspecting and the gullible, who discover the sting a little too late in the day.
But can one really blame them: After all, there is also money to be sent back to the village for the waiting mouths. One such worthy was recently caught on a television channel camera painting over the raw strawberries in his cart with red paint from a small sprayer. So buyers, beware of exceptionally shiny fruit for, ‘all that glisters…’
But here one wishes to talk of another phenomenon that is increasing both in frequency and intensity by the day in Lahore, namely the drug addicts sprawled dead to the world (occasionally actually so) on the city streets on a ‘high’ and the baby-carrying (physically and/or on the way) beggars who accost one the moment one reaches for an already moth-eaten wallet to make a payment. If one wished to see the first obvious symptoms of a failed state, a walk down the Mall, once the glory of Lahore, would not be amiss.
All along the historic avenue one comes across the drug addicts, once the ‘roof and crown of things’ but now reduced to beastly specimens in varying degrees of intoxication, oblivion and undress, amid the biological filth they have created. And they are getting bolder by the day: they menace people at the bus stops and smoke without fear in public places as they lurch and stagger around on the road. A word of caution: never be caught downwind of one of them or the memory will linger on long after the event. Sometimes one sees small children smoking away their lives in their no longer innocent heavy-lidded eyes, another ‘dreadful object’ added to the daily dose of horrors one has become accustomed to, if not immune, in our daily lives.
Most of the petty crime in the city, such as your garden hose vanishing in a jiffy, outside water taps found removed, vandalized seats and benches or any other missing article that can readily find a buyer in the junk shop, is courtesy these opportunistic and desperate zombies seeking their next ‘fix’. Surely the Lahore City District Government needs to look into this rapidly increasing phenomenon and take immediate remedial action to rid the main city arteries and roads of this depressing sight (and scent). But one suspects that any serious move in this direction would not sit well with some worthies of the Punjab police, for obvious reasons.
As for the ‘profession’ of begging, it has also been turned into a money minting mafia, for that is what mafias are formed for in the first instance: profit. The well-known intersections of the city are now literally swarming with all manner of alms-seekers, and the most horribly disabled are put on display by unscrupulous exploiters to garner the sympathy and financial support of the faithful. The commonplace traffic jams are their bread and butter so to speak as they hound and harass the passengers in their vehicles by various means. One can evade the able-bodied and aggressive of the beggars only by employing a Clausewitzian strategy of feinting, or a bypassing envelopment or even a double envelopment, but more often a hasty tactical retreat is the only war gaming solution. Again it is the responsibility of the city administration to put an end to this sorry and sordid business which has now reached ridiculous proportions. And with the advent of Ramadan, one shudders to think of the state of affairs with new ‘imports’ being shipped daily into the city for the holy month when even the tightfisted Scrooges are generously inclined towards their fellow man.
So, dear city administrators and the ‘brown sahibs’, at least take a stroll on the Mall and see with your own eyes how matters stand (or lie in uneasy, sometimes semi-naked sprawl) on this once historic avenue of Lahore with all the now empty five star hotels, and also check out some of the city intersections for the other plague of beggary. The twin evils, which are spreading like an epidemic, must be wiped out before the capital of the Punjab is overwhelmed by them and the ordinary citizen or the occasional tourist, aptly disguised in shalwar-kameez, can no longer venture out without being subjected to disgusting scenes by the increasingly aggressive drug addicts and professional alms-seekers.
A humane and well-thought rehabilitation programme is therefore of the most capital importance, and urgently.
The writer is a freelance columnist.