Karachi is known as the second largest city in the world. It consists of many towns and cities. Lyari, a small but most densely populated town with an approximate population of 186,494, is mostly famous for art, literature, politics, and sports. It has been producing emerging artists, players, boxers, singers, poets and Literati for ages. Football and boxing both are widely played with much enthusiasm.
Lyari, undoubtedly, has a very unforgettable past, which for a long tenure stopped its heartbeats. Streets of Lyari are evident that it has experienced both radical and liberal politics. Some occult and invisible forces not only obviated the student politics all over Pakistan but also prevented Lyari and banned book culture and also libraries and poisoned Lyari with weapon culture. Lyari, which was famous for the dwellers of literature and art and sports, turned into red blood. The streets of Lyari, where literature used to be worshiped and football used to run, turned into rivers of blood. Literature, art, and sports were massacred in the land of Lyari. Thus, Lyari has suffered a prolonged period of turmoil in the shape of unprecedented war and destruction.
But now, the dark age has come to an end and now we are seeing the flood of literature, art, music and sports again in Lyari with the same enthusiasm and spirit among the youth of Lyari. However, it is still deprived of many things.
In Lyari people are living in misery in a tiny space of place for ages but they have been spending their days. Because, in terms of other cities of Karachi, living in lyari is affordable for poor people but if we see both past and present, the people in Lyari were always suffering. They have very tiny and congested places, where since last few months, load-shedding is on the peak. After every three hours, power goes off. Since the last December, people are using gas cylinders and the poorest people are using woods to cook.
Recently, it was announced that in winters gas will be totally blackout and the water crisis is already going on. Most of the youth in Lyari, both male and female, do not make it to the university due to financial problems and other social factors. Lyari still lacks in terms of educational facilities, as science and maths teachers are unavailable in the majority of government schools.
Secondly, due to petrol hikes, rickshaws charge extra, but when you tell them you are going to Lyari, because of the broken roads and sewerage water flowing after rain on roads, rickshaws mostly avoid and charge extra amount. The roads are in the worst and most devastating situation that one may feel like they are taking their last breaths with so many jumps and digs and filthy water on roads.
Lyari General Hospital, where thousands of poor Lyarians visit for their treatments, and from both of its entrance gates water is filled on roads, even though, before the rain and without rain, it was always filled with sewerage water. Moreover, the entrance gate of Mullah Fazul Library, the only library of Lyari, is filled with water too. Students are troubled to cross it for visiting library.
It is true that young people in Lyari are mostly engaged not with academics but also with sports where often they end up with disappointment for no such careers offered to them. Here the people are so enthusiastic about football and enjoy the matches that every evening you can see them cheering the grounds. Even grounds are always filled and people either standing or sitting on the walls to watch the matches. Though the players know they have no future ahead, as football flows in their veins and they keep playing with the same energy and zeal. But now as the monsoon season has been going on since the end of June, the matches are disturbed: grounds are now empty.
Today, the youth of Lyari are not spoiled with weapons, but they are poisoned with another deadly weapon and that is drug addiction. Drugs in Lyari are being so widely circulated that every second person has access to it and can be seen infusing it publicly. Drugs have become so common that minor children, instead of going to school, are found entrapped with drug addiction.
Thus so far, the shapes of weapons have only been changing in Lyari, the people here are still rotting in a peace-less society and there is no end to their suffering. Firstly, matches were not played due to war but today due to sewerage water on grounds after rain. Some time ago youngsters were poisoned with guns and today with drugs.