The stage has been set.
Inside the Sindh Sports Board Club in Karachi’s Nazimabad, the polished floors of the badminton courts await feats of agility, the handball arena echoes with the memory of past battles and the gymnastics equipment stands ready for athletes to defy gravity.
These are the halls where national champions will be forged, where dreams of representing Pakistan are supposed to take flight.
But just outside the door, there’s a rot. A mountain of festering garbage, a sprawling heap of neglect, surrounds the complex. This is the first and last thing athletes see, the insufferable stench their constant training partner.
The National Games are set to kick off on Dec 6, with athletes from all around the country travelling to the metropolitan to participate in the event.
But the only thing reaching peak performance levels is the public health crisis engulfing the venue.
“It’s a task breathing outside the indoor courts,” Hajra Nawab, the Director Sports Officer (DSO) Central, told Dawn, her voice heavy with frustration that has clearly been mounting for weeks.
The words are an understatement. The reality is a toxic cocktail of pollution and putrid smell that makes every deep breath a gamble, every training session for the athletes a test of endurance against more than just their opponents.
According to sources, neither the Pakistan Sports Board nor the Pakistan Olympic Association, the very bodies created to foster athletic excellence, have taken meaningful notice.
The silence from the top is deafening.
Hajra has done everything a dedicated official can do. She has written the letters. She has discussed the matter with the Assistant Commissioner. She even received assurances from the Commissioner Karachi that the filth would be cleared.
“But it never happened,” she revealed. “The dumping of garbage has only increased and no measure had been taken till now.”
But while athletes trained under duress and officials sent desperate letters, a quiet, digital record was being created — one that proves the highest levels of the Karachi administration knew precisely about the crisis.
A “Field Visit Report” from the Office of the Commissioner, Karachi Division, dated November 27 and obtained by Dawn, reveals that a team from the commissioner’s office conducted a detailed inspection of the sports complex.
The report, titled “Aims to Clean & Green Karachi,” logs a series of GPS coordinates taken between 1:25 PM and 1:31 PM.
These coordinates, when mapped, place the officials directly at the perimeter of the Sindh Sports Board Club, pinpointing the exact location of the festering garbage heap that Hajra had complained about.
This official documentation creates a stark contradiction. It confirms that the Commissioner’s office — the same office that had given assurances to the sports director — was not only aware of the issue but had physically witnessed it.
The digital paper trail shows they were there, walking the grounds, logging their presence at the scene of the neglect. Yet, the garbage remains.
The report now stands not as a mere metadata ghost, but as a damning visual indictment. They saw the problem, they photographed it and they still allowed it to fester just days before the National Games.
The implications are staggering.
Athletes who have trained for a lifetime for this moment will be forced to compete while navigating a biohazard.
But Hajra clarifies the stakes, which are far greater than any medal tally.
“We want it cleaned not because of the Games but the serious health concerns it poses,” she insists.
The complex is not an island; it sits beside Government College For Men, Nazimabad, where thousands of students breathe the same poisoned air.
It is nestled in a residential area, where families live with this reality daily.
The Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) has already called for a health emergency in parts of Karachi earlier this month. This venue is now a glaring, unanswered part of that emergency.
“This is a residential area too, with students also in the colleges, are getting affected daily,” Hajra said.
So as the countdown to the opening ceremony continues, a different race is underway — a race against indifference.
The nation’s finest athletes are preparing to compete for honour, while the state has provided them with a venue of disgrace, documented in their own official files but ignored in reality.
