ISLAMABAD: Days after Karachi’s population was recorded wrongly, the government appointed a committee. It will investigate “undercounting” in key cities during the seventh population census.
Geo News stated that Karachi’s population was lower than the 2017 census after 95% of the counting. So far, the metropolis’ population is 13.9 million.
Karachi’s previous census population was 16 million. Political parties deny the figure’s accuracy.
After concerns about the first digital census, Minister for Planning, Development, and Special Initiatives Ahsan Iqbal formed a committee. Said committee includes Secretary Planning Syed Zafar Ali Shah, Chief Census Commissioner Dr. Naeem uz Zafar, and provincial chief secretaries.
Moreover, The Ministry of Planning, Development, and Special Initiatives stated the committee will investigate “undercounting” in important cities and propose a solution to ensure a transparent and legitimate census field operation.
While, The orders came at a digital census progress meeting.
The planning minister ordered the Census Monitoring Committee to explore how to finish on time. He also ordered Suparco to geo-tag “missing” slums to count their populations.
Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah, Minister for Information Technology and Telecommunication Syed Amin ul Haque, PBS chief census commissioner, secretary planning, National Database and Registration Authority director, National Telecom Corporation managing director, and other stakeholders attended the meeting.
The top census commissioner updated guests on targets met and the issue of undercounting in big cities, high-rise buildings, and slums. He stated that PBS monitoring teams are searching “low-coverage areas” to uncover the “real issue”.
The official attributed “low coverage” to field enumerators’ undercounting. He requested more watchful provincial officials to handle the situation.
