World Bank funding to pay for revival of Karachi’s public aquarium

Karachi: Funding from a World Bank-assisted programme is going to be utilised to restore Karachi’s public aquarium near the city’s coastline that was closed some 25 years back.

The Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) has planned to utilise a funding of Rs800 million from the World Bank-assisted CLICK (Competitive and Livable City of Karachi) project to revive the aquarium within the next six months.

The aquarium is now part of the sprawling seaside park, Bagh Ibn-e-Qasim, spread over 130 acres area as being the largest urban park in the city.

Karachi’s Administrator, Barrister Murtaza Wahab, performed the groundbreaking of the project to revive the aquarium in the Clifton area of the city.

Speaking on the occasion, Barrister Wahab recalled that a visit to the public aquarium in Clifton was of part of his cherished childhood memories related to Karachi.

He said the aquarium became non-functional as systematic deterioration took place in the civic and amenity facilities of Karachi with the passage of time.

He said the closure of the aquarium meant that those coming to Karachi’s beach for spending their leisure time were deprived of an important source of recreation for a prolonged period of time.

He said the aquarium after its revival wouldn’t just fulfil the recreational needs of the people of Karachi near its coast but would also be helpful for researchers and students to minutely observe marine life.

He mentioned the KMC had been making efforts to revive the past glory of Karachi pertaining to the era from the 1960s to 1980s as the residents of the city should become part of this drive.

Karachi’s Administrator said that efforts were on to safeguard, maintain, and improve all the urban open spaces in Karachi as the citizens should fully own the healthy recreational sites in the city.