Thaindian News

Islamabad, Oct 27 (IANS) Pakistan faces a winter of discontent as the number of impoverished is increasing at a galloping pace, a daily said Thursday.

“Two deaths in the last four days are of note because they are powerful indicators of the sense of desperation that is felt by a majority of the population - the poor,” The News International said in an editorial.

On Monday, a married man who set himself on fire in front of parliament died. He left a note that said he was killing himself because of his poverty, joblessness and lack of money.

Just two days later, a Pakistan Railways pensioner died while waiting in a queue outside a bank. He, alongwith many other pensioners in Karachi, Rawalpindi, Quetta and Peshawar were waiting for payment by the 25th of the month. They did not get it.

The editorial said that there is no direct link between the two deaths other than poverty and “the failure of the state to honour its debts and pay those entitled their dues”.

“While agencies may squabble and disagree about the precise size of the impoverished in Pakistan, there is no disagreement that it is increasing, in some parts of the country increasing at a galloping rate.

“As poverty increases, so does food insecurity. It quickly becomes malnourishment and the deadly spiral has its endpoint with a burning man in front of the very building where our parliamentarians meet. It has its endpoint on a cold pavement in the dark of night where an old, hungry and cold man breathed his last. These are desperate people.”

It went on to say that the poor are being pushed into ever-more straitened circumstances.

“They are the single largest group by definition in the entire population. The danger is that desperation will turn to channelled anger - there have been numerous riots related to loadshedding - and we now face a winter of the profoundest discontent.”