KARACHI, June 14: As the summer is at its peak, Karachians are out enjoying picnics and the city beaches are the perfect spots to beat the heat. It is estimated that around 50,000 people visit city beaches every week amid rough sea conditions.

Such a situation calls for efficient measures on part of the relevant authorities to ensure the safety of the visitors, even if they are not planning to go into the water, as it is very risky even if the visitors are merely relaxing along the shoreline.

Unfortunately, an ill-equipped and much-neglected Emergency Response Centre (ERC) of the city government appears to be quite incapable of offering rescue services.

During visits to some half a dozen beaches situated along the nearly 20km coastline of the city, it was observed that the picnickers were exposed to danger partly due to the very fact that they openly defied government warnings issued during the season and mainly owing to the insufficient safety measures taken by the authorities and the indifferent attitude of the lifeguards posted at the beaches.

A visit to some of the main beaches revealed the sorry state of affairs of the ERC, which is administered by the city government’s municipal services department.

“The ERC has a 58-men strong workforce,” said an official. “The divers, who are supposed to perform rescue services, have been brought in from different departments of the city government to the ERC, which includes the fire department, medical department and the defunct KDA (Karachi Development Authority).”

The official deplored the manner in which the relevant authorities were operating the centre. He told Dawn that ERC staffers were performing the same duties but on different pay scales, which was unjust. Elaborating, he said the staffers who had been brought in from the KDA enjoyed grade 11 of the local government’s pay scale, but those who had been transferred from the fire department had been performing duties under grade six.

“Duties of both type of employees are the same but not the privileges,” he said, adding that the divers had not been provided with vehicles, which hampered their mobility. “They are left with no choice but to cover the 22km long coastal strip on foot and stop people from swimming in the rough sea,” he said.

Interestingly, this writer also witnessed three divers associated with the centre trying to get a lift from picnickers to the ERC.

This problem is being faced by the low-ranking staffers on a daily basis; on the contrary, the high-ups seem to be enjoying, rather exploiting the already scarce resources of the ERC.

A fire tender was also seen parked at one of the picnic spots. When inquiries were made, it emerged that it was actually supposed to provide the staffers at the ERC with fresh drinking water. Surprisingly, the fire tender has been transformed into a water tanker as most of its fixtures have disappeared and the vehicle has been rendered useless when it comes to fire-fighting.

Though most of the staffers showed ignorance about the deteriorating condition of the vehicle worth millions, a few claimed that costly equipment that came with the tender had been sold in the open market over the years.

Disappearing fuel

Apart from this, four rescue boats provided to the ERC are also mostly sitting idle as these are rarely used. However, 300 litres of fuel provided every month to run them managed to be consumed well within 30 days every month, said some staffers.

Same is the case with an ambulance, which is part of the ERC’s fleet but rarely used. Interestingly, records show that it consumed the allocated quota of 200 litres of petrol quite regularly every month.

According to some ERC staffers, around 800 litres of diesel supplied to the centre for carrying out various rescue operations was also not consumed for the purpose they were meant for.

“But we have nothing to do with such mismanagement or embezzlement,” said a low-ranking official. Accusing the high-ups of such wrongdoings, he said: “We are not part of such misappropriations.”

He also informed Dawn that despite being engaged in such a risky job, not a single ERC diver had life insurance.

It would be pertinent to mention here that around six people had drowned in the sea during the past few weeks alone. Besides the daredevil attitudes of our citizens, the relevant authorities also deserve blame. If adequate measures are not taken on time, loss of more precious lives cannot be ruled out.