Sindh government to launch Hawke’s Bay beach project
Sindh government to launch Hawke’s Bay beach project
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| Hawke's Bay Karachi |
Rashid Hussain
The Sindh government has planned to invite private investors to develop Karachi’s Hawke’s Bay beach, with the facilities of international standards that people enjoy at beaches of developed countries. Modern huts and three-star hotels will be constructed after demolishing the present 254 huts which have been on leases for a long time.
Sindh government plans to get the beach developed by a public-private partnership, for this purpose, the Sindh government’s Public-Private Partnership unit will be tasked to invite private investors to build this public infrastructure. A chartered accountancy firm will be employed by Karachi Municipality Corporation to evaluate the value of the beach sites.
The Public-Private Partnership board has approved the construction of the 8-km Mauripur Expressway with a two-lane one-way interchange at ICI Bridge. With the construction of this road, the traffic issue of the area would be resolved and a hassle-free access to the beach would become possible.
Hawke's Bay is a beach in Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan, it is located 20 km southwest of Karachi city. The beach is named after Bladen Wilmer Hawke, a British politician who owned a house on the beach during the 1930s, he died in 1939. The beach is very popular for huts, swimming, camel, and horse riding; people come from different parts of the country to spend a day or two in rented huts on the beach, for picnics, party, and other recreational activities. Foreigners also keep visiting the beach throughout the year.
Since the 1960s, there have been huts on the beach, Karachi Municipality Corporation has been allotting leases of the beach plots to people who have built their huts and have been paying the fee of the leases every year. The majority of the huts are given on rent to the visitors charges range from 2000 PKR to 20,000 PKR per day, some huts are built by companies for official use and some people have built them for themselves. About 150 huts out of 254 remain available for the public on rent.
The huts owners, went to court after they received notices from KMC that their huts would be demolished, they say the KMC refused to receive the annual lease fee from them, deliberately they have not been accepting the fee since 2017 and now it is blamed that hut owners are not paying the lease renewal fee.
This is not the first time that the government is planning a developmental project on the beach; in 2006-07, when Syed Mustafa Kamal was a mayor of Karachi city government, the City District Government of Karachi (CDGK) had asked the hut allottees to vacate their huts for Sugar Land City project under a public-private partnership program to redevelop the Hawke’s Bay as per the international standards.
The hut owners are much concerned about the Sindh government’s decision to revamp Hawke’s Bay, there are hundreds of people belonging to 12 villages in this area, earn their livelihood from renting out their huts. Some people have even purchased the concrete huts, temporarily constructed on the government’s land, with the approval of KMC in the past; they say they would protect their rights in the court.
People of Pakistan have also a legitimate right to enjoy the facilities of international standards while picnicking and having other recreational activities, developmental projects like the one Sindh government is planning to launch at Haw’s Bay Karachi, should be approved and accomplished soon. But before this undertaking, the government should also compensate and assure the affected hut owners and locals that they would be given priority while redeveloping the Hawke’s Bay beach.
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