At this year’s United Nations Climate Change Conference held in Dubai this week, Pakistan’s Dr Alia Haider Karmal received the Frontline Climate Health Award for her medical relief efforts during the floods in 2022. She was one of three doctors nominated for their efforts in rising to difficult situations created because of global climate change. Dr Haider as well as her husband, Dr Hasnain Abbas, have been operating free Khalq Clinics for working class communities in Lahore most of this year and have together raised much awareness around preventive healthcare in Chungi Amer Sidhu and Sharifpura.

Much of their daily work involves attending to patients suffering from a plethora of illnesses related to consuming unsafe drinking water and breathing toxic air. Their work has occurred alongside efforts of the Action Research Collective led by Punjab University’s Dr Nousheen Zaidi and her team of scientists in Chiraagh Ghar, Chungi Amer Sidhu. It has been over two years now that they have been advocating for access to clean drinking water in these areas claiming that many illnesses could be prevented if Lahore’s citizens can get access to safe drinking water and clean air.

The doctors and researchers being recognised for their efforts globally say that at home their advocacy for people’s right to a safe environment is often met with hostility and suspicion from government bodies including the WASA and the PCSIR. In some instances, government bodies have refused to acknowledge the extent of pollution. Proponents of development through road infrastructure continue to defend the city’s decision to initiate construction on several roads and underpasses in Lahore.

Within this context, appeals to fundamental right to clean environment feels defeatist and the scoundrel’s last resort. A pal of mistrust around the intention of common man pervades bureaucratic and state structures. They complain that frequently the common person does not know what is good for them. As a result, attempts to change things for the better are met with extreme suspicion and mistrust. No one hates appeals to fundamental rights more than the rulers. That is why, despite admirable attempts by the legal community and activists to seek environmental justice or interventions directed specifically at workers or residents of working-class communities, their efforts are consistently met with suspicion or dismissal.

The year 2023 began with the news of the arrest of Jamaat-i-Islami’s Maulana Hidayatullah Rehman, who was leading a campaign against trawling near Gwadar. Trawling is one of the most destructive ways of industrial fishing that depletes the marine ecosystem. Nothing can come in the way of a trawler’s massive nets scooping everything all the way down to the ocean bed. Before there was a crackdown on illegal trawling, there was a crackdown on the people raising awareness about the plight of those effected by trawling. A documentary on Netflix called Seaspiracy is a great place to start to educate oneself on the dangers of allowing trawling.

Once a state identifies environment and human rights defenders as its enemies, it finds ways to obstruct or downplay their work. In this tussle, important questions about protecting the ocean are lost.

If there is such a thing as citizens’ fundamental right to clean environment, then we must pay attention to the fact that our citizens are separated along degrees of exposure to pollutants in water, air and soil.

Despite being a signatory to the Basel Convention that looks to curb dangerous ways of disposing technological waste, Pakistan’s coastline is used as a dumping site for the electronic waste of many developed countries. Its shipbreaking industry is infamous for accepting assignments that other countries refuse owing to the presence of oil sludge that either catches fire or ends up in the ocean.

Over the past few years, the number of ships brought to the Gadani Shipbreaking Yard has plummeted following global calls to end dangerous ship breaking. Because of this, shipbreaking workers that remain must accept worse payment and working conditions. However, conversations about their lost livelihoods are entirely missing from the environmental question.

If there is such a thing as citizens’ fundamental right to clean environment, then we must pay attention to the fact that our citizens are separated along degrees of exposure to pollutants in water, air and soil. As Pakistan’s climate becomes a matter of global intervention and discourse, it is important to explore the connection between occupational safety and how work might be creating these degrees of exposure.

Environmental depredation has worsened the life of the working classes who were already affected by a lack of occupational health and safety. This year, Advocate Usama Khawar published a report on the prevalence and status of government efforts to deal with silicosis, a terrible illness rampant in marble, cement and stone crushing facilities. Khawar began work on collecting data on silicosis back when he was a student in 2012. A decade later, the implementation of the Supreme Court’s directives on the matter is under way.

In a developing country, it is expensive to even think about protecting people and the environment. In fact, most talk of protecting the environment is seen as an elite concern as it is assumed that the poor can’t possibly begin to fix the situation. The banning of Qingqi rickshaws in the Punjab is an example of how those in government and the elite continue to defray the cost of protecting the environment on to the poor. This is done by first, framing the poor as the cause of environmental problems and then banning them from using their implements. Nothing meaningful truly happens to protect the environment.

There is a deepening contradiction between the health of the environment and the development goals of the country’s elite. The scale of climatic catastrophes and air and water pollution Pakistan faces today is the cost we are paying for our neighbouring countries’ development. Before we start dreaming about becoming another China or Switzerland, we need to reconsider what we imagine development and prosperity for this country’s people to look like.

The writer is a journalist and an anthropology student at the University of Texas at Austin