A man-made famine in Tharparkar

Is it, as the Sindh government says, all honky-dory in Thar?

While the national media continues to highlight the plight of the children in Tharparkar, the PPP government insists that there is nothing unusual about the situation. Information Minister Sharjil Memon has blamed the media for creating the hype. Why doesn’t media highlight the issue of 600 children dying every year in Pakistan, he asks? Weren’t child mortalities common in Thar before the PPP came to power? The situation, according to him, has in fact improved, for which he claims credit.

The situation in Thar is no doubt being used as a stick to beat the PPP with by political rivals. This is what the PPP would have done if another political party had been in power. This only shows how callous politicians have become to use even human tragedies to gain political mileage.

But is it all honky-dory in Thar? Memon simply lies when he claims there is nothing unusual in the area. What he is doing is a cynical defence of the government’s apathy combined with inefficiency.

For the last two years Thar is facing drought that could be the worst in living memory. With no monsoons, wells are drying up. There are no crops to feed the population and nothing for the livestock to survive on. Food shortage has led to famine-like conditions and malnutrition among expecting mothers and children.

Qaim Ali Shah is assisted by four advisors, 17 special assistants, four coordinators, one political secretary, and four parliamentary secretaries. Was there none to tell him what was happening on the ground?

What one sees happening in Tharparkar was not an unpredictable catastrophe beyond human power like a major earthquake or a Tsunami. The famine did not burst out suddenly but unfolded over months and then continued to worsen while the government looked on with apathy. A number of government ministries and departments failed to take measures to stop the situation assuming crisis proportions. Everybody was aware of the implications of the continuing drought. No one was bothered to do what he was elected for.

There are 25 ministers in the Sindh cabinet. Half of them hold portfolios directly connected with the situation in Thaparkar. CM Qaim Ali Shah is assisted by four advisors, 17 special assistants, four coordinators, one political secretary, and four parliamentary secretaries. Was there none to tell him what was happening on the ground?

Successive governments in Sindh have neglected Tharparkar with the result that the district has the lowest Human Development Index among the 24 districts of the province. With its feudal mindset the PPP government, which is in place since 2008, treated the population no better. There was a presumption that the people of Thar had faced drought generation after generation, and coped with it without government assistance. It was understood that they were used to high child mortality, which was a consequence of malnutrition. Hadn’t they put up with their lot patiently all these years without making protests like people from urban areas? Why arouse expectations in the population that it was not presumed to possess?

Qaim Ali Shah’s government simply failed to monitor the situation and take timely measures to provide the much needed food, water, medicines and fodder for the livestock. Had this been done the tragedy could have been diluted if not entirely averted.

Reports about the ravages caused by drought and children’s deaths started appearing in the media in early March. The issue was taken up by the National Assembly on March 10. The stand taken by the PPP MNAs indicated a cynical unconcern for human life.

Faqir Mohammad Shah, PPP legislator from the drought-hit district, told the House the death of 48 children in a little over two months was not something uncommon for the region. He claimed that no-one had died of hunger and most of the deaths had been caused by diseases. Asked why he had not raised the issue in the National Assembly which was in session till last week, the MNA said things were under control in his constituency when he left for Islamabad to attend the session. He expressed complete ignorance when his attention was drawn to reports in the Sindhi media that Thar had been facing a famine-like situation for weeks. “I have not seen such reports,” he said.

Khurshid Shah expressed similar views. “The situation is not as serious as being portrayed in the media,” he claimed. Wheat could not be distributed among the affected people because of financial constraints, but things were now under control after two visits by Qaim Ali Shah to the area. He concluded on the note “Such incidents take place every year and there is nothing new about it.”

Reports about the ravages caused by drought and children’s deaths started appearing in the media in early March. The issue was taken up by the National Assembly on March 10. The stand taken by the PPP MNAs indicated a cynical unconcern for human life

Next day the Sindh Avocate General Fateh Malik took a similar stand in the Supreme Court. He accused the media of exaggerating the issue. He admitted that 60 children had died so far and explained that drought was not the only reason for the deaths. Cold weather and local people’s reluctance to go for timely treatment were other factors, he added.

Chief Justice Tassaduq Hussain Jillani observed during the hearing, “We should hang our heads in shame”. The chief justice said it was only because of the media that the plight of people of the area had been highlighted.

Finally, on March 26, the matter came under discussion in the Sindh Assembly. The government was initially in an all too familiar state of denial. There was nothing unusual, it was maintained. When pressed, the CM resorted to dissimulation.

He told the members that there was little substance in reports of deaths of children in the district due to drought. He asked if the deaths were caused by famine, why only infants and not a single child of 10 years or above had died from hunger. “There is no proof of a single death from hunger.”

This was hiding facts by resort to semantics. The children die of malnutrition or of treatable ailments due to lack of resistance, the malnutrition is directly connected with drought which kills livestock. There is therefore no extra milk available for the children. Mothers suffer from shortage of calories and breast feeding provides insufficient feed to the child.

Famines don’t occur in functional democracies, the world was told by Nobel laureate and economist Amartya Sen. The large scale deaths of children in Thar are a reflection on the quality of democracy in Pakistan. As long as the governments are insensitive to human suffering, democracy would remain vulnerable.