On the northern outskirts of Karachi, Pakistan’s former capital and current economic capital as well as the country’s largest and most densely populated metropolis, stands Orangi Town; ranked in 2016 by the UN-Habitat Report as one of the world’s largest and most densely populated slums.
The context: the origins of the phenomenon
Since the end of the 1990s Pakistan has experienced rapid urbanisation, which is still growing today. This phenomenon has affected the country’s largest cities, particularly Karachi, to the extent that in 2016 the United Nations described it as the twelfth largest and most densely populated metropolis in the world.
One of the main reasons for this urban change is the large-scale migration flows, both internal and external, that have affected the city.
According to a study by the International Growth Center (2017), the population recorded in 1947, the year of independence of the country, was about 450,000 people. The latest Census carried out in 2017, on the other hand, reports a figure that reflects the profound and radical changes that have affected the Asian metropolis: 16 million people populate the provincial capital of Sind.
This large influx is the result of numerous phenomena that can be traced back to economic, historical, political and cultural events.
According to the data reported by the World Population Review (2021), one of the first factors of attraction for migrants to Karachi is the strong presence of large industries born as a result of its rapid economic and technological development, which began during the colonial era. The British, recognising the strategic position of the city both as a commercial port that guaranteed an outlet to the sea for the inland countries they controlled, and as a direct link with the north of India, began to invest in the construction of modern connection systems and industries.
This phenomenon has been further reinforced in recent years by economic policies that provide for large investments in the secondary and technological sectors and increasingly limited interventions in the primary sector, the previous source of livelihood for most villagers.
Another phenomenon that has strongly influenced the immense growth of the metropolis dates back to the separation of Pakistan from what is now India. Numerous Islamic believers from the newly formed India, Bangladesh and other South Asian countries settled in Pakistan to escape the ill-concealed religious persecution in their home countries.
Predictably, as with other Asian metropolises that have grown spasmodically in recent decades, Karachi too has not been able to meet the housing demands of such flows of people. Indeed, a study conducted by UN Habitat (2016) estimates that the demand for housing in the Karachi urban area is three times higher than the supply.
As an economic capital, it attracts thousands of people from increasingly abandoned villages and other parts of the country. Due to the disproportionate growth of the population, the building space has quickly shrunk and, increasing disproportionately in price, has become a privilege of the few. As a result, migrants, unable to find housing solutions suited to their economic possibilities, settled in slums.
Another element that has favoured the huge proliferation of informal areas in the “city of lights” – as Karachi was renamed by locals and tourists in the 1980s, due to its intense and vibrant nightlife – is the insufficient and inadequate interest of the government in the possibility of building versatile and medium/low price housing solutions that would really meet the needs of this category of people.
In fact, the recent World Population Review (2021) reports that more than half of the inhabitants of the Asian metropolis reside in katchi abadis, a local term used by the inhabitants to refer to these types of housing, especially illegal unauthorised ones.
Orangi Town, the largest katchi abadis in Karachi
Of the approximately 600 katchi abadis in Karachi, the largest and most densely populated in the metropolis is Orangi Town. The slum covers about 22 square kilometres and is currently home to more than 2 million people.
Although the local authorities and literature consider it to be an informal settlement, a considerable part of the territory has been legally registered and is officially considered an administrative district; it receives aid and benefits from some services provided by the central administration.
According to the first official information, this settlement is one of the oldest in Karachi, having been established around 1947 with the arrival of Muslim refugees from the newborn India. The Pakistani government at the time allowed such groups of people to settle freely in certain sections of public land.
Indeed, around 1950, the occupied territory – which was about 1300 acres – was officially recognised as an administrative district. This legalisation did not last long and within about two decades, with the arrival of refugees from the newly formed Bangladesh (1971) and the uncontrolled growth of the metropolis, Orangi Town grew out of all proportion and the new territories were never officially recognised.
This peculiar duality makes the living conditions of the residents extremely difficult, as the services present are insufficient and poorly distributed, in addition to being a territory that is mostly squatted and therefore constantly exposed to eviction requests or illegal attempts to eliminate it.
The main problems currently affecting the area include overcrowding, the absence of an effective education system, a high rate of violence and crime, and the lack of an effective water and sanitation system.
As in most Asian slums, the inhabitants of Orangi Town also live partly in permanent brick or concrete buildings and partly in makeshift dwellings made of sheet metal and plastic sheeting. The element that the two macro-categories of housing solutions have in common is overcrowding: the average size of the latter can vary from 25 to 40 square metres, with an average of 6 to 8 people living there. Often, all daily activities are carried out in one room, making the dwellings unhealthy and inadequate places, well below minimum health and safety standards. In addition, overcrowding, together with poor sanitary conditions, appears to be a major risk factor in the transmission of diseases, both those that cyclically afflict residents and the current Covid-19 pandemic.
A further problem in the larger katchi abadis of Karachi is the absence of an effective education system, truly capable of providing quality education and training to the children and young people living there. The public facilities present are both insufficient in number and inadequately located in relation to the number of residents and, in most cases, suffer from a lack of material, facilities and personnel. There is a high drop-out rate among school-age children and young people and a high illiteracy rate among adults.
Educational poverty and school drop-outs, together with the difficult working conditions in the metropolis and the problems caused by the rigid division of the territory between the numerous ethnic and religious groups, lead to a high level of violence and crime in the slum.
Women are the primary victims of petty crime and sexual harassment: from 2011 to 2014, 77% of women living in Orangi Town were victims of rape.
One of the most serious and long-standing problems in the area is the lack of an efficient and functioning water and sewage system, a problem sadly shared by all the nation’s inhabitants: only 20% of Pakistan’s population has regular access to drinking water and sanitation.
The situation is dramatic throughout the country, but it is the inhabitants of informal settlements who suffer the worst consequences. Much of their water supply is often contaminated by faecal sewage, toxic chemicals used in agriculture and industrial waste that is not properly disposed of. Most of the deaths – especially of infants and children – and illnesses in these areas are caused by lack of access to clean water.
The sanitation situation in Orangi Town, as in many slum areas in Asia and the world in general, is dramatic and is worsened by the lack of a real and properly functioning sewage system. Residents, consequently, do not have access to adequate sanitation, increasing the spread of diseases and epidemics.
Residents’ agency: the strength of the Orangemen Project Pilot
Given the conditions of severe deprivation and instability faced by the residents of this area, the Orangi Pilot Project was initiated in 1980. The Project comprised a number of programmes including: a programme, almost entirely financed and managed by the residents, to improve their sanitary conditions using as few resources as possible; a programme to improve housing, which has now contributed to the construction of 93,000 houses; a programme to provide the population with the necessary tools to improve their eating habits and lifestyle; a programme aimed at the rural development of neighbouring villages; and finally, a programme to provide basic educational services to all residents.
The results obtained were extraordinary, and the originality and strength of the project is not so much in the technical innovations or in the way the funds and materials were managed, but more in its basic philosophy and methodology. The individual programmes were proposed to the inhabitants, and the communities established the methodology, timetable and thought out the techniques appropriate for them to solve the main structural problems.
The strength of the Orangi Pilot Programme lies in its ability to motivate, provide technical support and advice to the population, which has, almost independently, improved the inhabited area as far as the territory and policies from above would allow.
Although the current living conditions of the residents remain well below the minimum standards for a dignified life, it is possible to say that, since the project began, the general living conditions have improved significantly and indeed, some programmes have brought about a considerable and incisive change: thanks to the programme aimed at improving education, the schooling rate of the residents of Orangi Town is slightly higher than the average for the metropolis itself.
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