By Mohammad Obaidullah Mirani
On the ninth of June, Federal Minister for Finance Senator Muhammad Aurangzeb will present the country’s annual report card, the Pakistan Economic Survey. The very next day, on June 10, thick volumes of the annual federal budget will be laid across the desks of the National Assembly. Television screens will fill with economic experts and government spokespersons dissecting numbers such as Gross Domestic Product growth rates and revenue collection targets. Yet behind these glossy PowerPoint presentations lies a bitter reality that neither the political leadership nor Islamabad’s bureaucrats appear willing to confront.
When I spoke with ordinary citizens, daily-wage labourers and middle-class mothers in Karachi regarding the upcoming fiscal announcements, the scenes were heartbreaking. Completely oblivious to macroeconomic terminology, an elderly taxpayer broke down in tears. In his trembling hands was an electricity bill that exceeded his entire monthly income. Weeping, he asked a question that no bureaucrat in Islamabad can answer: “Son, what is this budget and where does it go? We pay tax every single day on everything from a matchstick to fuel. Where is our hard-earned money being spent, if not on us? Whose elite privileges are being funded with our blood and sweat?”
This sharp public reaction from Karachi’s citizens is not merely an emotional grievance. It is a funeral elegy for Article 3 of the Constitution of Pakistan, which binds the state to eliminate all forms of economic exploitation. When the state squeezes the poor dry for tax revenues but fails to provide them with basic drinking water or affordable electricity, it commits the ultimate mockery of the constitution.
A comparison of the government’s budget data reveals another chapter of institutional apathy. Last year, the federal government allocated a meagre Rs8.30 billion for Karachi’s mega development projects. This year, after slight adjustments, the amount has been increased to Rs11.19 billion. Power circles in Islamabad and Sindh may celebrate this nominal rise of less than three billion rupees as a grand favour to Karachi, but for a city of more than 25 million people, the amount remains a cruel joke bordering on petty charity.
According to official papers, these funds are earmarked for 11 mega projects, including the construction of the Power House Chorangi Flyover in North Karachi and the 4-K Chorangi Flyover in Surjani Town, alongside the rehabilitation of eight critical roads, including Haji Ibrahim Isa Road, Korangi Link Road and Baldia Stadium Road. While this list may appear alluring on paper, it raises a larger systemic and political question.
Karachi’s citizens are no longer fooled by these paper lollipops. The public demands to know why the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, which enjoyed decades of power and representation on the back of this city, failed to look back at it. Why does this economic hub resemble ruins today despite its prolonged political dominance? On the other hand, the Pakistan Peoples Party has ruled the province for consecutive terms, yet whenever development was delivered, it catered not to the common man but to preferred elite circles and feudal interests.
Why do these political actors, who sweep the largest share of revenue and votes from Karachi, turn deaf and mute to the city’s rights the moment they step into the corridors of power in Islamabad and Sindh? The unspoken truth is that a Karachiite does not merely pay taxes on utility bills and fuel; they also pay an exorbitant secondary premium to private tanker mafias for basic water because of administrative failure.
While the city requires 1.2 billion gallons of water daily, it is officially supplied with only 650 million gallons. To quench this thirst, the vital K-IV water project, conceived in 2002 at an initial cost of Rs25 billion, has ballooned to more than Rs224 billion because of state incompetence, pushing its December 2026 deadline further towards 2029.
Meanwhile, middle-class youth continue to pay an undocumented street tax to armed robbers every single day. Official data from the Citizens-Police Liaison Committee reveals that, in just one month, more than 3,500 motorcycles, 150 vehicles and 1,400 mobile phones were snatched at gunpoint, with resistance often costing young men their lives.
This is not merely the failure of an economic survey. It is the economic strangulation of a city. The political actors who constantly boast about the 18th Constitutional Amendment and the National Finance Commission Award must answer why funds released in Karachi’s name never trickle down to the municipal level or the streets of the poor. Whether it is the Rs8 billion of last year or the Rs11.19 billion of this year, the amount is not a healing balm on Karachi’s wounds; it is an insult.
(The writer is a columnist, mostly writes social and political issues. He could be reached at editorial@metro-morning.com)
