KARACHI: All possible assistance, civic amenities and facilities would be provided to the Ismaili community members so that they could organise the Aga Khan’s Diamond Jubilee Celebrations in a befitting manner in the city, said Mayor Wasim Akhtar.

He was talking to a four-member delegation of the community led by Amin Lakhani, which called on him at his office to discuss various programmes being organised in connection with the celebrations.

He said Prince Karim Aga Khan would be given a warm welcome on his arrival in the metropolis in the first week of December. Special arrangements would be made and all assistance would be provided so that various functions, including the ones at the Aga Khan Park in Clifton, Nishtar Park, Bagh-i-Jinnah, Britto Road in Garden, could be organised properly.

He said the civic agency would make special arrangements and roads leading to and around the Jamaat Khanas and the neighbourhoods where the community lived in big numbers, would be cleaned and city wardens would be deployed. Fire brigade staffers as well as rescue services would also be kept vigilant, he said.

Paying tributes to the work of the community as well as the Aga Khan Development Foundation in the fields of education, health, culture, heritage etc, he said that people living in many parts of the country benefitted from these projects.

Earlier, briefing the mayor on the celebrations, Mr Lakhani said the 49th leader of his community, Prince Karim Aga Khan IV, had completed 60 years of the Imamat. He was given this position as a successor of his grandfather Sir Sultan Mohammad Shah Aga Khan III on July 11, 1957. He said the diamond jubilee celebrations were being organised from July 2017 to July 2018 around the globe.

Published in Dawn, November 25th, 2017