The Socio-Cultural Determinants of Begging: A Case Study of Karachi City

Sakina Riaz ,Mumtaz Ali Baloch

doi:10.7176/jesd/10-11-09

Abstract

The present research paper aims to find out the socio-economic status of beggars' in Karachi city. A descriptive research design was employed by using survey method. The primary source of data collection was face to face interviews. A sample of 140 street beggars, were selected from different public places using purposive, a non-probability sampling technique.Data analysis, chi- square test of association was done.The key findings of the study show that begging is a structured profession in the city. Data indicated that the majority of the respondents have their own houses and they become the professional beggar in a routine with high satisfaction their existing profession. This study suggests that there is an urgent need to design and implement a comprehensive urban policy in order to control and the begging practice in the city. Keywords : Socio-Cultural Determinants, Begging practice, Karachi. DOI : 10.7176/JESD/10-11-09 Publication date :June 30 th 2019

Highlights

ILO (2004) defined begging is defined as: “a range of activities whereby an individual asks a stranger for money on the basis of being poor or needing charitable donations for health or religious reasons
Due to the non-availability of exact statistics about beggars living in Karachi, it was a great challenging for the researcher to find out the actual number of beggars living or working on the street in Karachi and conducts the research on the topic.; a quantitative method was used for data collection for this study
These results have confirmed the research of a familiar study, conducted by Ali. et al (2004) in the Pakistani context. Another interesting and distressing finding is that 27.7% of beggars, who belongs to rural background, have completed their Matriculations. This result indicates that there is a missing link between quality of education and the economical consumption of the students.this study found that there is a strong connection in different variable like internal migration, poor quality of education, low wages or joblessness, and marital status, which pushed the respondents to enter in informal economy as survival strategy

Summary

Introduction

ILO (2004) defined begging is defined as: “a range of activities whereby an individual asks a stranger for money on the basis of being poor or needing charitable donations for health or religious reasons. There is not a specific single reason which is related to begginning , still, it has different reasons and ground for its continuing practice in diversified culture. It is the consequence of a variety of socio-economical and biological aspects. The tradition of begging has long roots in different culture and closely associated with religion in South Asia for instance in India, where charity is measured one of the noblest human quality according to Hindu tradition (Dhruvasan 1963, P:10-12). In various religions like in Islam, Christianity and even in Hinduism seeking alms is an opportunity to earn God’s blessings (Kaushik,2014).This situation becomes more critical if any beggar has been suffering from any chronic disease like leprosy and mental illness, it tacitly criminalizes the illnesses (Mander, 2009)

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