Rush in Buses
(Taqdees Durrani, Karachi)
Almost every citizen of Karachi
has experienced the public transport system of the city and 9 out of 10 times
has fallen victim to the overcrowded rush of the passengers. The experience is
worse than that of a crowd in a market selling stuff for free.
People who take the bus everyday to their, offices, schools, colleges,
universities, shops etc are forced to endure this torture. Getting up at 6:00 am
and stepping into a jam packed bus over filled with people hanging from ledges
and corners reminds us about stuntmen in movies but in this scenario they are
not payed but in fact are paying to do so.
These bus drivers disregard the safety of the people and don’t even think twice
before boarding new passengers onto an already congested vehicle. What is worse
about these insane conditions are the unhygienic conditions of the bus. A
regular person has to suit up and look good for whatever destination he/she has
to go but at the end of the trip is covered in sweat, his/her clothes covered
with stains and his/her hair looks like it was not even attended to since the
person woke up.
A lot of the time this rush becomes the cause of mental and physical stress
which in turn results in on board fights about reasons so bizarre that in normal
conditions one never even stops to think about.
A lot of the time the rush is so intense that one is not even able to hang on
the make-shift poles and ends up risking falling down.
It is my humble plea to the Ministry of transport to take some major steps as
soon as possible and assure proper support for poles for standing passengers to
hold onto it and that no more than 25-30 passengers must be present on a
mini-bus at a time.