People of Sindh have reservations against census results, says CM Shah

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KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah on Wednesday once again expressed his reservations against the provisional census results.

Chairing a high-level meeting ahead of the Council of Common Interests meeting, the chief minister said that it is very much clear that the people of Sindh have reservations against the census results; the statistics department should share the details of blocks with the Sindh government so that it could be counter-checked.

He said that the Sindh government would like to see the next elections based on the provincial results of the census, and for it, amendments need to be done in the Constitution.

Shah said that the federal government should announce elections on due time.

The meeting was attended by provincial ministers: Jam Mehtab Dahar, Dr Sikandar Mandhro, Dr Asim, CM Sindh Principal Secretary Sohail Rajput and Sindh Chief Secretary.

Sindh government rejected the provisional results of the sixth population census by terming the results as a conspiracy against the province by the federal government.

Senior PPP leader Nisar Khuhro said the PPP government will not let the province be treated in an unfair manner.

“We will not let the federal government treat the province unfairly and we will take what is rightfully ours,” said Khuhro.

The provisional government also alleged that Sindh’s population was shown to be less than its actual number in order to not increase the province’s share in the National Finance Commission (NFC) award.

The PPP-led government has also decided to call an all party conference to discuss the reservations.

Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) leader Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, when asked if his party will attend the conference, said that the issues raised need to be discussed and MQM-P is willing to attend dialogue on the issue.

He added that the MQM-P will attend any dialogue if it concerns Karachi and added that Karachi's population was also shown to be less than what it was during Zia's regime.

Questioning the census, he said if the people of the metropolis can not be counted properly, how would the issues of the city be resolved.

The MQM-P leader further alleged that certain localities of Karachi were excluded from the census and said the party had already petitioned the court before the provisional results were released.

Federal government rejects reservations

The federal government rejected the reservations raised by the Sindh's political parties and said the process of conducting the census was transparent.

It added that all provinces had monitoring committees which were briefed on a regular basis while the census was being conducted.

The government further said that additional time was given to address all reservations and complaints.

The PPP is not the only major political party in the province to raise reservations over the census results, MQM-P leader Farooq Sattar on Sunday announced to lead a protest rally in 72 hours against the provisional census results.

Speaking at the party's general workers’ convention at PIB Colony football ground, Sattar said by understating the population of Karachi census results have done injustice to all ethnic communities living in the metropolis.

He said that Karachi's population in actual is around 30 million - whereas according to the census it is 10.6 million.

Leader of the Opposition Khursheed Shah had also raised reservations over the provisional report of the population census and said the records of the Statistics Division and the Pakistan Army should be compared.

Results released for the citywide population in the provisional census conducted by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics show that Karachi’s population has ballooned to 14.9 million people in 2017 as compared to 9.39 million in 1998.

Thirty-three per cent of Sindh’s 47.9 million-strong population lives in the province’s two major cities, Karachi and Hyderabad.

While the provincial capital’s population grew by 59pc in nineteen years, Hyderabad’s population only grew by 0.6 million during the same time.

Pakistan's total population has been recorded at 207.774 million, according to the provisional summary results of the sixth population and housing census.

The sixth Housing and Population Census began after a period of 19 years on March 15. The census was conducted in 16 districts of Punjab, eight districts of Sindh, 14 districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 15 districts of Balochistan, five districts of Azad Jammu and Kashmir and five districts of Gilgit-Baltistan.