07. Sep. 2021
Set in Karachi, Pakistan, the drama documentary Into Dust follows social activist, Perween Rahman, who worked tirelessly to protect Pakistan’s poorest communities, and her older sister, Aquila Ismail, who honours her sister’s legacy by fighting for her justice.
Perween Rahman was an internationally renowned architect, planner and social scientist. In 1982, she began working with the Orangi Pilot Project (OPP) on upgrading informal settlements by supporting their communities in building sanitation and water supply infrastructure, schools, and improving housing. In 2013, she was murdered for exposing the systematic stealing of water from Orangi’s inhabitants, and her older sister Aquila Ismael subsequently decided to take up the baton and continue the work:
Video: Honouring Perween Rahman’s legacy from Grundfos Foundation | PDJF on Vimeo.
Poor sanitation is undoubtedly the most distressing problem of the low income settlements. Poor communities succeed somehow in building houses, but they fail to make proper arrangements for disposal of excreta and waste water. The cost of flush latrines and underground sewerage built officially by the contractors is too high for poor people.
OPP discovered low cost methods, through research and taught the lane residents, through technical and social guidance, to construct sanitary latrines in the homes, underground sewerage lines in the lanes and secondary sewers with their own money and under their own management, while main water and sewage lines and treatment plants remain the responsibility of the government.
“The demonstration of the impact of the program lies in the fact that that now Orangi is a thriving township housing 2.3 million people which constitutes 10 per cent of Karachi’s population.“
OPP-RTI website
Through Orangi Pilot Project Research and Training Institute (OPP-RTI), the Foundation is funding extension of water and sewerage lines in poor, underserved settlements in cities across Pakistan. Since its inception, the NGO has helped over 7.6 Million people get access to water and sewage system. The systems have borne the test of time as lines laid in 1982 still function. Find out more