Grocery shopping for most middle class families is a family time. The whole family goes out for fun while running errands. The rush you see in the first ten days of every month on big grocery stores is usually due to that. Same way, another family from a small town in Karachi went to a departmental store to get their grocery done. What meant to be a family time turned into a tragedy without anyone even thinking about it.
There was an open manhole near the store and the family’s vehicle was parked there. Little Ibrahim, like every other kid started running towards the vehicle straight from the exit without the supervision of any adult and suddenly fell into the manhole that had no covering. Devastated, the father started calling every emergency number he knew while the mother frantically called for help nearby.
The lack of machinery led to the parents to pay for the equipment and get the help required to get their toddler out of the manhole. Hours and hours passed by but no result came. No one knew had the blueprint for the underground system so finding the boy was a needle in a haystack.
After 14-15 hours, the boy’s body was discovered by a scavenger who knew about the whereabouts of the manhole. Of course after this gruesome time, the toddler did not survive and his body was handed over to the officials for further investigation,
The child’s heartbreaking death — and the apparent lack of urgent response from civic authorities — sparked intense anger among family members and local residents. They staged protests on University Road late Sunday night and again the following day.
Several political parties had joined in, holding demonstrations against the provincial administration and calling for the Karachi mayor’s resignation. Petitions were also submitted in court, demanding accountability from city officials.
Karachi Mayor Murtaza Wahab later visited the grieving family of the three-year-old boy who fell into an open manhole in Gulshan-i-Iqbal and drowned. He assured them that a transparent investigation would be carried out and that strict action would be taken against those responsible.
Will the mayor and other government officials work hard enough to restore the geographical conditions in the city or will there be more incidents happen to shake up the people of Karachi, we will soon find out.
