The forgotten dead

Since creation of Pakistan in 1947, the population of Karachi has increased fivefold to 21.5 million, people in one city more than total population of some countries. With so many people living in one city, one is destined to face crime and violence, disease, poverty and death.

There is a term “Lawaris” used locally there in Karachi. It refers to the unidentified or abandoned dead. This is rapidly becoming a chronic problem for the city’s 21.5 million population, of which more than half are poor or on the poverty line.

There are only two fully functioning morgues for the public, only two. The main organization that does any humanitarian work is Edhi Foundation, as the government has no fully functional service of that kind.

The Edhi Foundation, on a daily basis, receives dozens of calls reporting about dead people found on the side of a street, and in some cases from a ditch, gutter, or someone’s home.

There is a quote from one such Edhi Foundation worker: “There is no beauty in death. You are what you are when you’re alive. All one’s ego, one’s wealth, once someone is dead, that is the end, it’s all over.”

Often the workers of Edhi Foundation pick up the corpses of drug addicts, criminals, the poor, or those who do not have anyone for them.

If no one comes to claim the bodies, or loved one’s cannot afford to bury their dead, then they are buried in Edhi Foundations own cemetery. About 86 thousand have been buried and out of which 35 thousand remain unclaimed.

Even in such a state of decay and atrophy of society, there are those who still desperately cling to any semblance of humanity they have left.

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