SITE: When industrialists are forced to work in a hell-hole

KARACHI: Ironically, the largest sty in the world is located in the land of the pure. In fact it is in Karachi, and is known as the Sindh Industrial Trading Estate (SITE). It is an industrial estate home to over 3,000 industries, shops and warehouses. SITE is managed by a quasi-government organisation called SITE Ltd, while its ‘tenants’ are represented by the SITE Association of Industry.

But why, you may ask, is this estate (which contributes approximately 28% to the nation’s treasury, mind you) dubbed a mere ‘sty’?

The answer lies in a of this 4,500-acre estate.

I once wrote a satirical letter to the editor that the US was looking for Osama bin Laden (OBL) in all the wrong places. OBL was probably hiding in SITE all along, I said, because the estate looked so much like a place like Tora Bora would. Unfortunately, today it is not even fit to be compared to that.


The 4,500-acre estate has been turned into a cesspool of filth and violence. PHOTO: EXPRESS

From the moment you pass through one of SITE’s many entry points – be it from Banaras Colony, or from Mauripur Road, or from Nazimabad, or from Metroville – till the time you leave the estate, you would undoubtedly agree that SITE is a rather ugly sight. The infrastructure has totally collapsed and roads are full of potholes, drowned in stagnant water and so bumpy that motorcyclists find it hard to handle their vehicles.

Industrialists who traverse these roads daily dread bringing their new cars to this filthy place. Commuters travelling on buses usually sit on the roof, performing acrobatic feats in an attempt to save themselves from falling off. The worst nightmare is travelling on the side roads or lanes. These are akin to the rocky and steep mountains one may find in Balochistan or Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.

SITE is blatantly encroached on by whoever pays the piper. Makeshift huts are found on every corner: these shops sell food, betel leaves, oil, and just about everything else. Even the drains are encroached. Janitorial staff is seldom seen in the area. The whole estate is filled with unpicked garbage that, at times, spills over onto the roads and lanes. Political slogans, threats from ethno-religious political elements, remedies for male impotence and haemorrhoids and advertisements for educational institutions can be found sprayed rudely on nearly every wall in the area: even obelisks, billboards and curb stones have not been spared by aspiring graffiti artists.
Things become all the more difficult and frustrating when petty criminals start staking out the dilapidated roads to hunt the vehicles which slow down. They snatch cell phones and wallets conveniently, confidently and shamelessly.


The 4,500-acre estate has been turned into a cesspool of filth and violence. PHOTO: HTTP://WWW.SITE.COM.PK

The administrators of the estate rarely leave their offices. However, we are repeatedly reassured that the concerned minister will regularly visit SITE Ltd. Why? Who knows. But the sad fact is that SITE has crumbled and is probably beyond repair. I have to ask, what happened to the millions in development allocation for the estate? Where have the funds gone?



The 4,500-acre estate has been turned into a cesspool of filth and violence. PHOTO: ONLINE

The SITE Association of Industry is no more a strong body. It has no voice, where once it was called the ‘voice of industry’. The Association leadership and senior members (including me) are concentrating more on the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The other industrialists and traders operating in SITE have accepted that it is better to be quiet and, when needed, pay bribes and get things done. After all, there is no other option left.

Hashim B Sayeed, former chairman and a founder of the SITE Association of Industry, once lost his calm and, with disdain and scorn in his voice, termed SITE a “pigsty”. How very right he was!

The writer is an industrialist and a businessman active on various local and international business forums
Published in The Express Tribune, May 27th, 2013.