By Faisal Yakoob
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Amin H Karim
Intersection of Victoria Road and Clark Street. The corner building is still there and was the dental office Dr.. Sukhia as well as of the father of President Arif.Edit or delete thisSaad Bashir
Amin H Karim sahib is right. The photograph, it seems, has been taken standing atop Paradise cinema. The area with the palm trees must be where Jabees was later built.
The corner building on the right indeed contained the dental offices of Dr Sukhia and Dr Ilahi Alvi – the same offices where Arif Alvi cut his teeth first as well, in more ways than one!
The very nice corner building on the left was replaced by a modern high rise – part of which is called Farid Chambers. It has chambers of myriad lawyers. Justice Nasir Aslam Zahid used to have his legal offices therein before his elevation to the bench.
If one goes right one ends up in the Sindh High Court building. Before that on the right is the main Passport Office and on the left Pakistan Secretariat offices – offices of several federal departments and institutions. Pakistan Medical & Dental Council’s Karachi office used ti be among them. (It has now moved to Clifton, off Beach Ave, opposite Shirin Jinnah Colony and Ziauddin University Hospital.)
If one moved along Abdullah Haroon Rd towards M A Jinnah road, opposite the erstwhile Paradise Cinema is the Mehboob Cloth Market and a little further along the Saddar Post Office and between them in the side street there used to becthe Capitol Cinema.
Now, of course congested, heavily trafficked and unfortunately no longer the functional heart of Karachi it used to be.Amin H Karim Beautiful characterization of the area and spot on Dr. Saad Bashir; Other memorable businesses in the area were a photograph studio on the Clark Street side (Now Shahrah-e-Iraq). The ganney ka juice walas continue to do thriving business south of Paradise Market which replaced Paradise cinema. They serve a variety of fruit juices with an occasional fly crushed in. 🙂 Jabees Hotel continues to rot away, no longer the center where literati met for coffee and hors d’oeuvre. Interesting area though and only gets worse in congestion and dilapidated buildings as one goes north on Clark Street till you dead end at St. Patrick’s cathedral.Edit or delete this
Adnan Zuberi Amin H Karim the photo studio named Fotoko. My very first passport size photo for school ID, photo for DMC ID card, for House Job Certificate and my last passport photo before moving to UK in 90s was from this shop. Next to Fotoko if we r moving to masjid Khizra and Passport office there were few barbers shops. Charlie’s was one of them. I am not sure now, my last visit to this place was in 2008 or around. And just in front and other side of the road few children were used to do Hand Car wash.Adnan Zuberi Amin H Karim the old building which is still there in your latest photo next to JBees hotel called ILACO house, if I m not wrong. The head office of Siemens Pakistan was there.Saad Bashir You are right Adnan Zuberi. ILACO – Ideal Life Assurance Co – building was built there and Siemens indeed had its Pakistan head office within, even as late as 10 years ago. Further along in the same direction was built Aimi House, for decades the head …See MoreZarin Shroff That is the corner of Household clothing store called Samuel Fitz. Next was a bungalow of Parsi family. Samuel Fitz was the first household clothing specialising in uniforms. My friend Homie Amra worked there who later opened his own store called Homes and Co on the corner of Victoria Roaf and Preddy Street.Adnan Zuberi Saad Bashir and Husnain Lotia, here’s Mrs Rakhshanda Khattack Javeri. She appeared in a movie Jane Bond 008 with Reza Fazeli( Iranian) in late 60s. That was a Co production of Pakistan and Iran. The film has a famous songایک اڑن کھٹولا آے گا،ایک لال پری کو لائے گاManage
Good Old Karachi 