Karachi: Empress Market losing character

[Naveed Yaseen]

By Fasahat Mohiuddin
The character of Saddar’s Empress Market, the city’s oldest and most prestigious marketplace, is being eroded with the passage each day. The hands of the clocks on each face of the clock tower, which once dominated the market, have disappeared, and the clocks themselves are in a state of total disrepair.

The paucity of funds for their maintenance had been going unnoticed and now nobody has a clue regarding the whereabouts of the precious hands of these 100-year-old clocks, a senior city government officer told The News on condition of anonymity. Shopkeepers also complained that they rarely hear about maintenance and cleaning of this market, despite the fact that they pay taxes regularly. One shopkeeper, Imran Guru said that they had lost customers; now, the value of the market was also declining and its paint fading.

Iftikhar, a visitor to the Empress Market, said that the City Nazim should maintain a separate department to secure these few heritage buildings to promote tourism. Four decades ago, Saddar’s Empress Market was a relatively peaceful place, free of traffic bottlenecks, smog, and constant honking. Reminiscing about “those times”, Anwar Dildar Qureshi, the owner of a restaurant in the market, said that few buses used to come to the area and traffic used to be minimal and orderly.

The market was frequented by tourists until 1980, but they are a rare sight now, Qureshi said, adding that at the time, there was no concept of theft or robbery in the area. He also said that the sewerage system used to be efficient, and even during shopping continued even during rainfall, while colourful umbrellas would add to the view.

There is no elaborate lighting system at the market, while in the past, it glistened owing to the cleanliness of the buildings.

This, Qureshi said, was no longer the case owing to the thick black plumes of smoke being emitted round-the-clock. The whole market is surrounded by heaps of garbage and is in dire need of dedicated sanitary staff. The market also lacks adequate security arrangements. Rangers who have been deployed in the area are also at a distance from the market itself.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=205392