People in Sindh are beginning to wonder whether Prime Minister Imran Khan was their elected leader or a dictator.
There is a strong reason for this feeling to grain ground since Imran Khan took over as the Prime Minister. His party rules in three provinces but not in Sindh where the rival, Pakistan People’s Party leads the provincial government. This seems to have riled the PTI leader to no end. He rarely leaves an opportunity to interfere in the Sindh government’s affairs directly or indirectly. Sometimes he orders take over of hospitals in Sindh. On several occasions the federal government has ordered medical colleges in Sindh to give admissions to students from outside the province. At the same time, the government has denied any concessions to Sindhi medical students to take admission in colleges outside the province.
On top of it, the federal government has reduced the financial allocations to Sindh, another instance of injustice shown to the Sindhi people by the Imran Khan government. This move has deepened anger and alienation among the people against the federal government. A Sindhi member of National Assembly Sardar Mohammad Khan the government’s decision violated the principles of the Constitution. He pointed out that Sindh was ` a mini Pakistan` where people came from all provinces for employment and the province accommodated them all despite its limited resources but the Imran Khan government “ was creating problems for Sindh by each day. “
On paper, everything looks rosy for Sindh. In the government records, Sindh is as prosperous as Punjab and its people were endowed with coveted services and amenities. But in reality, the situation is altogether different—Sindh is in a mess, its people have to struggle hard to access government services. There is poverty all around and opportunities for education and employment have gone down since Imran Khan took over as the Prime Minister of the country.
According to a report by published by theInstitute of Social and Policy Sciences (I-SAPS), about 6 million children across Sindh including Karachi are deprived of education. In the province, more than 65000 government school buildings were in dilapidated condition. Even those schools, which are in working condition, have woefully inadequate drinking and sanitation facilities for children. Many have absentee teachers while others have a small staff to cater to a large number of students. Local newspapers have been on and off underlining the pathetic status of education in Sindh. One editorial asked the rulers that if the country could spend billions of dollars on weapons, why can’t a small amount of money be found to help hundreds and thousands of children bereft of even the most basic education
The state of school education is a reflection of the province’s rising poverty and desperation on the part of its people. Suicides due to poverty are now common in the province. Recently, a mother of seven children committed suicide in a village near Dadu, Sindh, because she could not feed her children. In Debeji, another woman, mother of four children, was forced to kill herself to avoid being hounded by money lenders. Newspaper reports recently mentioned at least seven such incidents in the province. These suicides due to poverty have created an atmosphere of fear and desperation among the growing number of poor in Sindh.
One of the major reasons for the abject poverty in Sindh is caused by rising unemployment levels in rural areas where farming has, over the years, become uneconomical. In the absence of industries and services in the province, more and more families have been forced into poverty.
Instead of paying attending to the woes of Sindhi people, the Imran Khan government has been more busy in exploiting the provinces natural and human resources. The question is how long will the proud and hard-working people of Sindh tolerate this step-motherly treatment? Will they too go the Pakthun and Baloch way?
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