ISLAMABAD: They stand at many crossings and hold small babies close to their chests asking for alms that are given to them by the passing by cars.
The question is, what is making them to come on the roads? Is it hunger or is it their profession?
Pakistan was envisioned as a ‘welfare state’ by great Quaid –i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the thought has been reiterated many a times by Prime Minister Imran Khan .
These women with children leave a big question mark, as where is the welfare state that has been trumpeted by the government officials. Where is ‘Ehsaas Programme’ that has distributed over 89 billion rupees among the poor so far as claimed by the authorities.
If these 89 billion rupees have been disbursed, then why these poor are still on the street? This question itself, if answered is worth billions of rupees.
The presence of these poor on the road depicts a trail that somewhere down the distribution line, the money got slashed as reports from Sindh have confirmed that people doing the distribution made their cuts in handing out the ‘relief package’.
This scribe shares these details from the personal experience of covering the tragic earthquake in 2005 where food was sent from people helping their brethren in need.
The very food was looted by many political big wigs of the areas, many truckloads were emptied in their warehouses. The details to date of the audit report about the earthquake embezzlement have not been shared and money that came could have rebuilt Kashmir and other affected area three times.