pls forget the spelling/grammer mistakes and say something about the point raised!

if these ‘Aliens’ were not around then life would not be that easy!

they are the cheap labour we depend upon.

ever thought how the hell more then a million illegal aliens cross over to the USA from Mexico. if uncle sam wants to close the gaps in his border, he can do it easily. the reality is their economy needs cheap labour to sustain itself, that is why they chose to look the other way.

the same is true for us, at least to some extent!

also, your definition of ‘alien’ is partially correct.. one word could have multiple meanings..

no offense, but I thought i should tell you that :)

life would’ve been very different in the city had people actually had to work to keep their houses clean and life orderly instead of sittin around ordering everyone around.

First of all using the term ‘threat’ to describe Afghans and Sri Lankan immigrants is typical of the scaremongering of racists throughout the world. It presents Afghans and Sri Lankans as a “threat” to “us” Pakistanis. Particularly when the author immediately follows this by saying that “there are problems that are rampant.” This implies that the the problems are created by the immigrants, when one has only to look at her list of problems (poor housing, poor sanitation, etc.) which actually shows that the immigrants are the victims of these problems more than anyone else.

“What happens when you legalize foreigners, allocate plots/housing to remove the existing kutchi abaadis? More pop up.” The author writes. First of all, much of the population inflow into Karachi in the past few years is from interior Sindh, Baluchistan, Punjab and NWFP. “Afghanis” (many of whom were born and have lived their whole lives in Pakistan) are not a significant factor in growing urbanisation in the last 10 years. The Sri Lankan hordes seem to be a product of the author’s imagination. Also, what is the learned author suggesting here? That we should not do anything for people living in Kutchi abadis? That we should not try to help the poor simply because more will “pop up”?

The case of Lyari Expressway is informative and notorious. Almost all development experts, urban planners, social workers etc. were against the plan, because it displaced thousands of people, and then built a giant, costly expressway through the middle of the city. They gave the examples of several mega-cities where expressways built in the middle of the city in the 70s and 80s are now being shut down because of the impact of environment, safety and congestion; going for the plan of circular roads to move heavy traffic outside the urban centre (Such as M25 in London).

This advice was ignored. The “compensation” was measly, given in irregular instalments, often not given at all, and the plots allocated were often out in the desert where there was no water source, no electricity, no phone lines, no public transport access. Even if these people somehow built a house to live in there, how would they get to work?

Of course for some of them this problem was solved since to build the Lyari Expressway, numerous factories, shops, schools, clinics, Church and mosques were demolished.

Funnily enough the mullahs didn’t complain too much about these mosque demolitions – its only illegally built mosques they seem to care about. Finally keep in mind, this displaced not just Afghans but Pakistanis of different religious and ethnic denominations.

In fact a good deal of the problems that kutchi abaadi dwellers face comes from official neglect and the sanctimonious attitudes of people like the author of this post. If I can quote Tasnim Siddiqi who is DG Katchi Abadi Authority and one of Pakistan’s only winners of the Ramon Magsaysay Award (Asia’s Nobel Prize):

‘”Contrary to common perception,” he says, “katchi abadi dwellers are neither criminals nor drug pushers, pimps, illegal immigrants, terrorists or leftwing revolutionaries. They are ordinary, law-abiding simple folks, eking out an existence.” What they need, he insists, is less prejudice from the establishment, fewer official obstacles to getting on with their lives and much more of the kind of assistance that will allow them to help themselves.’

Thats a quote from this article which I suggest you have a look at so that you can write about Karachi’s social issues with greater insight.
http://www.pathfinder.com/asiaweek/99/0806/sr3.html

I dont see a short term solution to this problem other than better border control. Any housing would have to come from charity because i can’t see how the kaachi abadi people can afford it.

What can be the solution??

Firstly, this sentence is plain, simple wrong: “These figures may baffle us with numbers”. You may either use ‘figures’ or ‘numbers’. You just cannot use both words as they mean the same thing.

Secondly, this sentence is also wrong: “two million aliens from Afghanistan and Srilanka”. As far as I know, that Afghanistan and Sri Lanka are populated with Afghanis and Sri Lankans respectively. And these are earthlings and not some aliens from outer space.

The word ‘aliens’ is used to denote those whose origin is not sure/confirmed. Even if a specie arrives from Mars tomorrow, then it will be caller a Martian and not an alien as its origin will be known.

I hope that this clarfies certain misconceptions.