The beach, particularly, Seaview Clifton holds a lot of significance for Karachiites. Over the years it has become a part of their identity with every Karachitte owning Seaview for better or for worse.

On Sundays, especially, you see people in large numbers from all corners of the city converging at Seaview.

And Karachiites own it

So it wasn’t surprising when this photo started making rounds of social media and pissed Karachiites off

A mini billboard is up at Seaview that reads ” A Gift From DHA To The People Of Karachi”

The image was up on social media accompanied by this caption:

“A new board is up all over Seaview Beach- “A gift from DHA to the people of Karachi”. Cruel joke! What is the Gift? The Beach? Footpath? Empty Light Poles? For God sake there are only 45 light poles from McDonalds till Village Restaurant(3 kilometres stretch)without any bulbs. It’s pitch dark at night. DHA/CBC, Sindh Government, someone should take responsibility and make this place lighten. Whoever comes to Karachi, I am sure they visit Seaview Beach. That’s one of the major landmarks of Karachi. I request the authorities to bring back lights to the “City Of Lights”

A lot of people were pissed at DHA after seeing this board

There were those that called out DHA for its negligence

And for not actually giving much of a gift to Karachi

On their part, DHA gave a clarification of their “gift” to Karachi

The ‘gift’ in this case, according to a statement by DHA, was the refurbishing of 12 Kiosks on Seaview. The new Kiosks are said to provide quality eatables and drinks to the people visiting Seaview at controlled/affordable rates.

For Karachiites, the beach is a symbol of unity that brings together Karachi walas from all across. The thing about Seaview is that it’s one of those places where everyone is equally welcome regardless of your background. As such when DHA implied that Seaview was a gift from them to the citizens of Karachi, people were pissed to say the least.

What do you think about all this?