Daily Times Editorial March 10, 2014

The Thar tragedy The tragedy of about 122 children’s death in Tharparkar over the last three or so months has shaken the top hierarchy of the country. Belatedly, the authorities have swung into action to bring relief to the suffering populace. The Sindh government is blaming the area’s bureaucracy for negligence and continuing lack of cooperation in the relief effort. Heads have rolled, prominent among them the Mirpurkhas Commissioner, the Thar Deputy Commissioner and some medical personnel. The cause of the children’s deaths, however, has become embroiled in controversy, not the least because of attempts by the ruling Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) in Sindh to allay the political damage by ascribing a variety of causes for the deaths. The attempt does not, however, nullify the perception that the cause of death may have been different in different parts of the area, but arguably they can all be traced to the common thread that runs through the narrative: drought, leading to lack of water, bad distribution of food, leading to malnutrition and various fatal diseases amongst the children, and most damagingly, neglect and a tragically belated response. To say, for example, that drought is a frequently recurring phenomenon in the desert region hardly explains why, when some five talukas (districts) of the six in Tharparkar received little or no rain this season, the alarm bells did not go off. If anything, complacency laces the authorities’ and some commentators’ statements that the people of the area traditionally migrate to the irrigated districts seasonally and in times of drought to find work in harvesting. In other words, the people are left to their own devices in times of hardship. Of all the rural areas of Pakistan, some like Tharparkar show a degree of official negligence, apathy, corruption, avoidable shortages and poor governance to add to the woes imposed by natural disasters like droughts. Such disasters are almost commonplace in the desert. The 2000 drought reportedly decimated the livestock population of the area, a critical source of livelihood for the populace. The authorities do not appear to have put in place since an efficacious system of veterinary services that could prevent avoidable losses of livestock, as the relatively smaller but nevertheless hurtful losses of livestock in 2011-12 show. The current crisis indicates continuing neglect and absence of any attempt to address, let alone pre-empt, the ravages of nature on the already precarious existence of the people of the area. If the bureaucracy in its time-honoured fashion is indifferent to the recurring plight of the people of the area, where are the elected representatives, ministers in charge, not to mention the chief minister? Why has it taken media reports of the children’s deaths to stir the conscience of elected politicians whose ultimate responsibility the welfare of citizens is? Where is, if at all it exists, the reporting system of the Sindh government? The Sindh government may have assuaged its conscience by dismissing some responsible officials and after the event rushing food, water, medicines and other items of relief to the stricken districts, but the question of accountability is not fully answered by such attempts at shifting the blame onto local officials while the political leaders of the province try to present themselves as pure as driven snow. To their credit, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has ordered all-out aid to the people of the area, the judiciary, civil and military, and other provinces’ response is heartening. The prime minister sys the National Disaster Management Authority is keeping him informed, but where was the Authority all these months while little bodies were wasting away and piling up in the sandy wastes of Thar? There is talk of a judicial inquiry into the debacle, but that can only be useful if it arrives at recommendations that, if implemented, could prevent such tragedies in future. The provincial governments of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have announced aid packages. The military and its medical corps have deployed in the area to bring relief and healthcare to the suffering populace, particularly children. This is of course all to the good, but if any lessons are to be learnt from this recurring human tragedy in one of the poorest, most difficult natural environments of the country, compounded by the man-made disaster because of negligence, they are that the system, whether democratic or other, deserves little or no respect if it ignores and neglects the poorest of the poor amongst its citizens, and carries on blithely as though business can continue as usual.