Driving down Khayaban-i-Jami two days before the May 30 deadline for taking down billboards given by the Apex Court's, I saw two persons up on a 60-foot high billboard frame hanging a new advertisement. This was at the crossroads which used to be called Submarine Chowk. It was evident nobody respected the Supreme Court order or had any fear of being punished.
Speaking at a consultative meeting organised by Shehri, Dr Syed Raza Gardezi a fortnight ago had predicted the Supreme Court order 'will not be respected'. He also said 99 percent billboards in Karachi were put up illegally. If anything matches the frenzy of putting up billboards it is the frenzy of building highrise apartments. Both target the consumer in a city which has the largest number of people with money to buy anything and are afflicted with shopaholic addiction.
This addiction is peculiar to consumer societies in wealthy countries or wealthy cities in dirt poor countries like ours. Dr Gardezi obliquely blamed the consumer for the menace of billboards. He said the Shehri could only tell people how to complain and to who. It is up to the people to do their bit to stop the menace, but unfortunately, few ever complain to the right organisations. It is really no use to complain to Shehri or even the Chief Minister's House complaint cell. Dr Gardezi suggested it would be far more effective to 'file a complaint with the companies selling the products (through the advertisements displayed on billboards)'. Will anyone do it? I do not think so. It is interesting to note recently the Chief Minister's House complaint cell released a list of 790 complaints from the city. They were about electricity issues, water shortage, gas shortage, municipal problems and the police. Not one complaint was about the menace of billboards.
The city has become a jungle of billboards and, of course a concrete jungle. This is cross commercialism and those who are profiting from it include the companies selling their products; the companies making the advertisements; and last but not least the greedy 'custodians' of the Karachi who are various housing authorities, and officialdom who allow green belts to be turned into a mass of billboards and footpaths to be cluttered with hoardings and 20 and 30-year-old trees to be mercilessly chopped down to make room for more and more billboards. In place of tree trunks giant pillars on massive footing rise up, sometimes three and four storey high, to accommodate the frame on which advertisements are hung.The safety wall on both sides of a bridge becomes a place for advertisements. Some of which are hung on the outside of the wall so motorists can see them.
There is always an increasein the number of new billboards just before Ramazan. This is to accommodate advertisements for women's and children's clothes, mobile phones, and household goods like furniture and drapery. Food franchises and TV channels launch new products, drama serials respectively. Welfare organisations needing Zakat funds will also begin to advertise soon. I do not know about this Ramazan but in past popular religious exponents had adorned billboards with their pious smiling faces and messages. They are not as popular now, so may be the pious brotherhood will give the billboard advertisements a missthis year.
All cities are ugly but each city also has its peculiar character. Karachi has lost it. Anything worth looking at is hidden behind billboards or a highrise building. Billboards are described as a traffic hazard but the argument is haywire, such as obstructing vision casting shadows on well-lit thoroughfares. The real problem is traffic jams or slow-moving chock-a-block traffic at the crossroads. I suspect this slowing down of traffic or the jam is deliberate. The police when it is directing traffic usually make drivers wait unnecessarily long, some times three to sixminutes and sometimes a half hour. You spend the time looking at the multitude of advertisements around. Perhaps you even decide which dress or new sofa set you plan to buy before Eid. How it is when the traffic signals are working the traffic flows smoothly, but never, never when the police are directing it? Actually, my suspicion is also farfetched, but what to do? When the handsome fellow in the next car to mine is looking at the billboard display quite fondly rather than at too pretty old me.
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