The pressure cooker of poverty

Ishtiaq Ahmed

If not absolutely right, it would not be entirely wrong to contend that poverty, amongst other things, is usually the root cause of many social evils in society. This is no different in Pakistan.  According to a recent assessment by the World Bank, poverty in Pakistan is up from 4.4 to 5.4 percent.

Over 2 million individuals have further slipped into this malaise. Overall, the poverty rate in Pakistan hovers around just under 40 percent and will stay there for 2022 -2023 and perhaps beyond.

Of course, these figures need to be adjusted to mitigate the impact of Covid-19 epidemic which has pushed furthermore families below the poverty threshold.

Sadly, there are tens of thousands of families who are unable to afford the very basic necessities of life – food, shelter, clean water, medicine etc. For some families arranging two or even one meal a day is a huge struggle.

Despair, frustration, disillusionment and depression are commonly experienced in conversations with families at the bottom end of society. In this ‘pressure cooker’ of poverty, it is not surprising to find people cutting corners in desperation to make ends meet or even turning to crimes or escapism.

Mass unemployment, unreliable paid work, and souring inflation combine to create a poverty conundrum for families which they find it impossible to break through. Inevitably, some turn to crimes, initially, to survive but then it becomes habitual malicious cycle of theft, robbery, blackmail, ransoms, drugs and even paid murder.

Financial pressures even push the most resilient of people on the edge, becoming extremely stressful, short tempered, and argumentative. These symptoms inevitably play out in family disputes, domestic violence, and other anti-social behaviors.

Women and children often bear the brunt of stress caused by financial poverty. Alongside, the inability to avail basic necessities of life- food, clothing, shelter, medicine, education- there is also a  dimension of violence to poverty.

It’s just not an unfortunate coincidence that in the year 2021,the country recorded 52, 370 incidents of violence against women in children. The social and the civic implications of sustained poverty for Pakistan are huge and a major impediment in the way of progress and development.

Poverty prevents human progress. We can’t expect an undernourished, physically and mentally under nurtured generation of today to play the role required of them f  development of the nation tomorrow.

Above all, the growing gap between those who ‘have it ‘and those ‘who don’t’ is proving to be very divisive, making Pakistan a nation of two halves.

Over the years, successive governments have launched many programs of social welfare to help the poor and needy, but most of these have failed miserably to achieve the desired goals.

These initiatives have not kept pace with the downturn of economy, decline in the value of rupee and the spiralling inflation.

In this social ignominy of poverty, the youth of the nation is the biggest loser: Children are normally held to be the nation’s future. Pakistan being one of the youngest nations, the development of young people is even more critical for its future progress and development.

In contrast, we have over 22 million children out of schools, in many cases, supporting their families to put food on the table. This is a serious indictment of where we are as a nation when it comes to preparing our children for tomorrow.

A large majority of our youth remain uneducated and without hope and opportunities. The successive governments have hugely failed to address the issue of poverty malaise. For the present interim makeshift government, the time is not in its favour but at least it can begin to get things into motion. We wait in hope and anticipation.