KARACHI: District West has emerged as the largest of the sprawling metropolis’ six districts, outnumbering district Central in terms of population and number of voters, and has witnessed increase in National Assembly (NA) and Sindh Assembly (SA) seats, it emerged on Tuesday.

The official facts and figures and fresh delimitations of the city show that with the population of four million, Karachi West is the largest of Karachi’s six districts, outpacing the Central district, which had been the largest for the past several decades.

In light of the recent census figures and voter rolls, the city has added one NA and four provincial assembly seats to its previous total, which now stand at 21 and 44 respectively.

However, with the fresh delimitations, Karachi West turns out to be the sole beneficiary of the increase in the city, grabbing the entire increase as it has added an NA seat — from earlier four to five — and four more SA seats — from previous seven to 11.

District West has witnessed arrival of many internal migrants

Officials said Karachi West hosted population of around four million of which around 1.6m were eligible to vote in the July 25 elections.

The fresh delimitations have reduced the share of Karachi Central in the provincial assembly seats.

It has four NA and eight SA seats — instead of previous 10.

Similarly, the city’s commercial hub — Karachi South — has just two NA and five provincial assembly seats as one seat each from the two legislatures have been slashed.

Malir’s previous tally of two NA seats has increased by one; while Karachi East has four and Korangi has three NA seats.

In Karachi Central, 65 per cent of its inhabitants are eligible to vote, which is the highest among all the districts of the country.

Similarly, 80pc of the inhabitants of one of its SA seats, PS-126, are eligible voters.

The districts of Korangi, East and Malir have seven, eight and five SA seats respectively.

Officials said the fresh electoral rolls and delimitations would be effective in the next local government elections, thus, most union committees would be formed in the West district. At present, most union committees exist in the Central district as per the census results of 1998.

Experts and officials said the phenomenal change in the ratio of population in the city’s districts had direct relevance to the country’s security and economic conditions.

“Most of the populations who have settled in Karachi West belong to the country’s northwest who migrated here chiefly because of hard security conditions and economic [factors],” said an expert.

Similarly, he said, large chunks of population from southern parts of Punjab and parts of Balochistan, which neighboured the West district, too frequently migrated here for security reasons and better economic prospects.

In addition to this, people in Lyari too had internally migrated there when it was hugely infested with criminal gangs.

People from other parts of Sindh, mainly those who migrated because of 2010 floods and subsequent worsening economic conditions in the rural swathes have migrated and inhabited various parts of the metropolis including Karachi West.

“This election in Karachi is going to be hugely different than what we have seen in the past. Everyone should be ready for surprises,” said a political observer.

Published in Dawn, June 20th, 2018