Naimatullah Khan

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Niamthullah Khan, (born October 1, 1930 Ajmer, British India) was the Nazim of largest city of Pakistan, Karachi from August 2001-June 2005. He did his Graduation from Punjab University, a Masters, a Post Graduate Degree in Journalism and a Law Degree from Karachi University. He Practiced Law for 34 Years along with welfare activities with several Non Government organizations with respect to rehabilitation and sustainable development.

He was first Nazim of Karachi after devolution plan. Many mega projects were started during his tenure. He belongs to Jamaat-e-Islami. He was among the finalists in the best mayors of the world for year 2004. But the rules stated that in order to make into the list a Mayor must be holding the office till the voting ends. Naimatullah left the office after failing to get re-elected in Local Bodies Election of 2005. Naimatullah is perhaps the most respected, well known and popular Mayor in the History of Karachi. After failing to re-elected Naimatullah Khan and his political party denounced the election as unfair and engineered but they accepted the results. The election in which the current mayor of Karachi, Mustafa Kamal, won, is widely accepted to have been marred by irregularities. MQM is reported to have its usual tactics of fear, intimidation, and violence to prevent large numbers of people from voting.

[edit] As City Nazim

When he took charge of Mayor's office the city of Karachi was witnessing a population growth rate of 5% per year but the pace of development was non existent. He set a pace of development in the city unprecedented in the region. Karachi had the worst possible means of transportation and poor roads when he assumed office as the City Nazim (Mayor). He started building flyovers, roads, underpasses, bridges and utilized the transport by importing buses and giving licenses to many private companies to run buses on the city roads. He made a major difference in the infrastructure particularly in transport which is quite visible now.

Naimatullah Khan is also well-known as an environment friendly Mayor. He introduced buses that run on CNG gas, built many parks and utilized the inactive department of Gardens. He also insisted that Heavy industries must be moved outside the city limits. He also started K3 water supply project which later reduced the level of water shortage from acute to moderate.

He is termed as an honest and sincere person even by his opponents and may be termed as one of the best and successful caretaker of Karachi city. Due to his extreme hard work on building and maintaining the structure of different civic facilities in Karachi, his successors feel very intimidated to perform their services with his speed and even try to become better in the eyes of Public. He may be termed as the pioneer in the sense that he has become a role model as a nazim and that people of Karachi may always compare the new Nazims' abilities with his achievements.