- Get drug addicts and beggars off the roads, permanently
The PTI government is groaning under a huge mountain of dilemmas (including the debt Mt. Everest), most of which are deep-rooted and can be eradicated only over the long term by following sagacious and determined policies. But there are some relatively lesser-key and swiftly solvable nuisances that also give rise to dismay and irritation among common citizens. The challenge posed by hardcore heroin addicts and professional beggar families which have mushroomed alarmingly and now swarm all over the city, is the basic responsibility of the local district government and the city mayor. If these two (former) irritants, which in a way can also be considered the manifestations of a failed state, are removed in a humane manner, strictly avoiding Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte’s extermination squad, ‘final solution’ methods, ordinary citizens, despite their present social and economic distress, would regard even such minimal changes a positive start towards the ‘new Pakistan’ and ‘Madina state’ envisaged by PM Imran Khan.
As always, any attempt to confront these twin menaces will entail ugly entanglement with the powerful mafias (impossible to avoid that term!) hiding behind these social evils. The junkies, even on the Mall, regard all the bus stands (where ironically a bus seldom arrives on time and which never provide shelter from the elements, being constructed in such a maddeningly inexplicable manner) as their sweet home away from home. The impressive wooden benches recently placed along the Mall are also monopolised by them, as few pedestrians would venture to sit where these almost animal creatures have slept, sat on and used to inject each other with infected hypodermic needles, leaving their foul biological residue (not carbon!) footprint nearby. Kicked out of their homes by disgusted, fed-up families, many die of overdose from an intake of a cocktail of potent drugs using primitive methods. These half-human individuals are breeding grounds of infectious diseases, and are also sly, opportunistic petty thieves, who would readily steal public or private property that they can easily sell to satisfy their opiate craving. One can walk downwind of them only at one’s peril, and the regrettable incident is not easily forgotten by those with ultra-sensitive olfactory sense. The flagrant manner in which growing numbers of addicts openly indulge their drug habit without fear of dreaded Punjab police crackdown, not only exposes the callousness of society at large and of mostly ‘micro-finance’ NGOs, but also raises serious doubts about the strange inactivity and lax response of official crime-busters in eliminating this notorious, but lucrative, activity.
Removing (not liquidating!) these two odious species from public places for good would earn the Punjab government cheaply-gained goodwill and much needed positive publicity
The professional beggars have also multiplied in droves, as is evident from their flooding all the major markets of Lahore. Entire families of the vagabond species who came over on Eid have apparently decided to stay put, liking what they see, though the Lahore streets are not exactly paved with gold. In this ‘vocation’ too there are invisible managers taking the lion’s share or cut, who assign territory, usually crowded street corners or inter-sections and busy crossing- points to their scrounger ‘clients’ for practicing their loud lamentations and guilt-inducing cries on the pedestrians entering their assigned zone. Equipped with powerful wallet- detection radars, they are swift to ambush anyone even holding this otherwise moth-eaten personal accessory while making a payment. Pre-empting them requires advanced knowledge of the art of war, such as making a feint in one direction, and then quickly changing track at the opportune moment, leaving them temporarily wrong-footed, while affording the intended target a dignified retreat. The relocation of these ‘monsters of fertility’ with children of all ages in tow (and more visibly a work in progress), towards an honourable, legitimate alternate calling, is essential for giving at least a semblance of local, if not national, well-being, apart from providing some peace and relief to the harassed citizens of Lahore.
Removing (not liquidating!) these two odious species from public places for good would earn the Punjab government cheaply-gained goodwill and much needed positive publicity and also end two major sources of citizen’s discomfiture and embarrassment. That would still leave the threat or terror of the crazed motorcyclist Corps of Lahore, with their hazardous, thread-the-needle driving, lack of time or patience to wait, consistent display of road rage, and blissful ignorance of that life-saving device known as the brake. ‘Forwards, always forwards, is their battle cry. They also need confinement: to a single lane, by law, as a starting point.
