KARACHI: Sindh Governor Dr Ishratul Ebad Khan administering oath to caretaker Sindh cabinet at GovernorHouse.

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17-memberSindh interim

cabinet sworn inSTAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—A 17-membercaretaker cabinet of Sindhtook oath on Saturday at theGovernor House in Karachi.Governor Dr. Ishratul Ebadadministered the oath.

Caretaker Chief Ministerof Sindh, Justice (Retd) ZahidKurban Alavi, was alsopresent on the occasionwhile Chief Secretary Sindh,Raja Muhammad Abbas,conducted the proceedings.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Election Com-mission of Pakistan hastasked different governmentauthorities to provide thelists of defaulters in 48 hours.

In this regard, notifica-tions have been issued toWater & Power DevelopmentAuthority (WAPDA, Paki-stan Telecommunication Au-thority, National Telecommu-nication Corporation, SuiNorthern Gas Pipelines Lim-ited, Sui Southern Gas Com-pany Limited, and Ministryof Housing & Works.

According to sources,ECP in its written directives

ECP seeks defaulterslist in 48 hours

Condition of bank accounts for prospectivecandidates relaxed

sent to all the aforementionedauthorities has stressed they

meet the deadline given sothat the electoral scrutinycould be completed in time.

The administrations ofPunjab House, KPK House,Sindh House andBalochistan House have alsobeen directed to provide de-tails of the outstanding duesthe defaulters owe to differ-ent utilities.

Moreover, the privateutility organizations havealso been asked to providelists of defaulters.

Earlier, ECP AdditionalSecretary, Afzal Khan, saidthat all the government, au-

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— shuts downwebsite

temporarilySTAFF REPORTER

I S L A M A B A D — E l e c t i o nCommission of Pakistan(ECP) has decided to shiftits website on anotherserver after cyber attacksthat continued on second

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Former presi-dent Pervez Musharraf ’sname was put on the ExitControl List over his involve-ment in several cases on Sat-urday.

The Interior Ministry hassent a notification to the Fed-eral Investigation AgencyImmigration in this regard.

On Friday, the Sindh HighCourt had ordered Musharrafto not leave the country with-out seeking prior permissionof the courts concerned.

Justice Sajjad Ali ShahShah had also granted a 21-

Musharraf’s nameplaced on ECL

day extension to Musharrafin the Benazir Bhutto assas-

sination and Nawab AkbarBugti case to appear and sur-render before the trial courts.

Musharraf arrived inKarachi on March 24 afterfour years in self-exile to con-test the upcoming general

Felt little insulted,humiliated standing

before judgeW A S H I N G T O N — F o r m e rPresident Pervez Musharrafhas said he felt a little “in-sulted and humiliated” stand-ing before a judge in aKarachi court, where he ap-

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UNITED NATIONS—Pakistanhas supported India’s standon the UN Arms TradeTreaty that would regulatethe USD 70 billion conven-tional arms trade around theworld, saying it favours thearms exporting countries anddoes not protects the inter-ests of importers.

“The treaty may be seenby many as essentially a prod-uct of and by the exportersonly. It falls short of strikingan appropriate balance of in-terests and obligationsamong the exporters and im-porters as well as the affectedstates,” said Pakistani Am-bassador to the UN Masood

Pak supports India’sstand on UN ATT

Khan. In his remarks to theArms Trade Treaty Confer-ence at the UN headquartersin New York ~ Khan said thecall for balance was echoedby an overwhelming major-ity.

“Some treaty provisions,however, legitimise in a glo-bal legal instrument what theexisting national andplurilateral export controlsystems cover. The interestsof exporting countries havebeen accommodated in theform of special exemptions,exceptions and protections,”he has said. The treaty fellapart due to lack of consen-

WASHINGTON—The latestround of threats exchangedby North Korea and theUnited States is draggingon longer and taking on amore virulent tone than inthe past, provoking deepconcerns among Americanofficials and their allies.

Following blusterywarnings by Kim Jong Un,North Korea’s 30-year-oldleader, and videos depictingNorth Korean attacks onthe United States, the

Aggressive talk from NorthKorea concerns US leaders

Obama administration tookthe unprecedented step thisweek of sending two stealthbombers to South Korea aspart of an ongoing militarytraining exercise.

But despite the escalat-ing tensions, U.S. officialssaid they have focused moreclosely on what North Koreais doing than on what it issaying.

“Putting on a show is notthe same as taking action,”said a senior administration

official, who spoke on thecondition of anonymity todiscuss the volatile situation.“Describing the situation asakin to war is not to be re-motely confused with want-ing a war, let alone going towar.”

The senior official andothers said that U.S. militarycommanders are closelywatching the situation,which has escalated sinceNorth Korea conducted anuclear weapons test in De-

cember. In addition, officialscited new levels of coopera-tion and mutual confidencebetween the United Statesand allies in South Korea andJapan.

While a direct attack onU.S. forces on the mainlandor in the Pacific seems un-likely, nongovernment ana-lysts said the rising tensionsincrease the risk of some formof limited armed conflict.North Korea recently cut off

DOHA—Afghan PresidentHamid Karzai was in Qatar onSaturday to discuss theopening of a Taliban officein the Gulf state for peacenegotiations that could endmore than a decade of war.

Karzai was welcomed atthe airport by Qatari Minis-ter of State for Foreign Af-

Karzai in Qatar to mullTaliban peace talks

fairs Abdullah al-Attiyah, theGulf state’s official QNAnews agency said, withoutgiving any further details onhis talks schedule.

Until earlier this year,Karzai was opposed to theextremist militants having ameeting venue in Doha as hefeared that his government

would be frozen out of anynegotiations.

The militants refuse tohave direct contact withKarzai, saying he is a puppetof the United States, whichsupported his rise to powerafter the military operation tooust the Taliban in 2001.

Eight injured inLahore factory fire

MUZAFFAR ALI

LAHORE—Eight people werebadly burnt during a fire at aplastic factory in Lahore’sQuaid-e-Azam industrial es-tate area on Saturday.

The injured included twofactory owners and bothwere in critical condition. Thefire moreover destroyedgoods worth millions of ru-pees.

Police said the fire envel-oped the factory during theearly hours of Saturday. Res-cue teams had reached thesite of the incident and hadstarted an operation. The in-jured were shifted to a hos-pital for treatment.

According to the prelimi-nary investigation, the fireerupted as a result of gas leak-age which filled a room.However, police was inves-tigating the incident further.

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Russia lashesout at US overNGO fundingMOSCOW—Russia’sforeign ministry is criticiz-ing Washington forchanneling funds to non-governmental organizationsin ways that get aroundRussian restrictions.

The complaint Saturdayby ministry spokesmanAlexander Lukashevichfollows U.S. State Depart-ment spokeswoman VictoriaNuland’s characterization ofrecent searches of RussianNGOs as a “witch hunt.”

Since President VladimirPutin’s return to theKremlin last year, Russiahas put strong pressure onNGOs. In December, as partof retaliatory moves againsta U.S. law, Russia bannedorganizations engaged invaguely defined politicalactivity from receivingfunding from U.S. citizens.

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PTI historicrally in Swattoday: ImranSTAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—PakistanTehreek-e-Insaaf ChairmanImran Khan has said thathis party was going tostage a massive show inSwat on Sunday afterholding a mammothgathering in Lahore onMarch 23.

Addressing partyworkers on Saturday at theIslamabad ConventionCentre, he said that the PTIwould announce itsmanifesto next week,vowing that the partywould end loadsheddingwithin five years aftercoming into power.

“People take turns inpower after spending hugemoney and keep makingmoney for five years butwe have to competemoney with our ideology,”Khan said.

He said that the biggest

Police officermartyred, twoterrorists killed

TARIQ SAEED

PESHAWAR—Bloody clashesbetween the Police force andthe alleged suicide bombersin Mardan on Saturday re-sulted in martyrdom of anadditional Station House Of-ficer and killing of two terror-ists. Besides, three civilianssustained injuries as one ofthe bombers blew himself upbefore he could be overpow-ered.

Reports reaching heresaid a police party on a rou-tine patrolling interceptedtwo persons riding a motor-bike in Katlang bazaar, some35 kilometers away from

QUETTA—Pakistan MuslimLeague Nawaz (PML-N)Balochistan presidentNawab Sanaullah Zehri saidSaturday that, “he had nocompetition with the BNP-Mchief Akhatar Mengal for theChief Ministership inBalochistan. He stated thiswhile addressing a pressconference during the join-ing of Mir Faeq Ali Jamali inPML-N here at his residence.“We wholeheartedly wel-come Akhatar Mengal for hisreturn and decision to con-test elections,” however, topslot in Balochistan would goto a person purely on thebasis of majority of the

house,” he said.Zehri, dispelling the im-

pression of divide within theparty, said that “we are intactin Balochistan and ticketswould be awarded to thecompetent and legible lead-ership keeping in view theinterest of the party”. He saidthat a committee comprisingeleven member was finalizingthe names of the candidatesfor contesting general elec-tions. Hailing the joining ofMir Jamali, PML-N leaderhoped that party would gainstrength in the Jaffarbadaand Naseerabad districts.

Earlier, Mir Faeq Jamalialong with his other tribal el-

ders announced to join PML-N. PML-N central leader Gen-eral (rtd) Abdul Qadir Balochand former Balochistan Min-ister Tahir Mehmood Khanwere also present. The officesof Election CommissionBalochistan will remain openin holidays. In a statement is-sued here on Saturday, Pro-vincial Election Commis-sioner EC Balochistan SultanBayazeed said that ElectionCommission of Pakistan hasbeen utilizing all available re-sources for ensuring con-ducting of free, fair and trans-parent elections 2013.

He said that ECBalochistan offices would re-

STAFF REPORTER

M U Z A F FA R A B A D —AzadJammu and Kashmir CabinetDevelopment Committee(CDC) has approved Rs 7.29billion development schemesof public welfare in differentareas. According officialSources, The AJK (CDC) ap-proved developmentschemes in a meeting chairedby Prime Minister Ch. AbdulMajeed here Saturday.

For transport and commu-nication sector, the committeeapproved Rs 318.289 millionfor up gradation of the 12 Km(PartI) Kotli-Palandri road, Rs251.108 million for improve-ment and metalling of the 25.57Km patch of Lakarmandi toPaintra Tehsil Barnala District

Bhimber and Rs 367 million fordifferent link roads inMuzaffarabad Division

The committee allocatedRs 372.005 million for 4.0 MWJari Hydro Power Project, Rs227.859 million for 1.0 MWBheri Doba Hydro Project, Rs399.781 million for 3.2 MWSharian Hydro Power Projectand Rs.2624.74 million for theelectrification of remainingareas of District Havali,Hattian, Neelum, Bagh,Sudhnoti, Bhimber, Mirpur,Muzaffarabad and Poonch.

For education sector, Rs392.409 million, Rs 225.318 mil-lion for plantation of trees andwood production. A total of Rs223.797 million for establish-ment of 100 skill developmentcenters, Rs 364.716 million.

Pir Rashidideath anniversary

tomorrowKARACHI—The death anni-versary of Pir Hassam- ud-Din Rashidi, an internation-ally acclaimed scholar ofSindhi literature and a his-torian, journalist and biog-rapher would be observedon Monday, April 1. Rashidiwas born at the house ofMohammad Hamid ShahRashidi, village Behman,Larkana District in 1911.

He took his primary edu-cation from MaulviMuhammad Soomar andMuhammad Elyas, said a pressrelease. Rashidi got Englisheducation from thestationmaster of Nusrat Sta-tion. He was very fond ofstudying books and newspa-pers, that’s why he got moreand more information and wasable to understand Persian,English, and Urdu languages.Rashidi began working in jour-nalism at the age of 18. First,he joined the newspaperJagan.

He became the editor ofAl-Manar Newspaper atSukkur in 1930. At last hestarted his own newspaper,Sitar-e-Sindh in collaborationwith his elder brother. He vis-ited many countries with del-egations of scholars.—APP

SHER MUHAMMAD KHAN

MULTAN—Political partiescandidates and independentcandidates submitted theirnomination papers for 13 Pro-vincial Assembly seats and 7National Assembly seats elec-tions to returning officers onFriday and Saturday respec-tively. Sheikh Tariq Rasheed(PML–N), Malik MukhtarAwan (PPP), MuhammadSadeeq Ansari (Independent)filed documents for NA–149,Makhdoom Shah MahmoodQureshi(Senior Vice PresidentPTI) for NA–150, ChaudaryAllah Ditta, Sayed Noor UlDin and Malik Khadim Hansfor NA–148, Haji SikandarHayat Bosan (PNL–N),Cathriene Nazeer, MalikShakeel Ahmad for NA–151.

Meanwhile, Rabia WahidBhutta, Malik Anwar Ali(PML–N), Malik Faiz RasoolRajwana (independent) forPP–194, Malik WaheedAhmad Bhutta, Abdul Majid,

Muhammad Saleem ShahBukhari, Jawad AhmadChaudary, Saeeda JamalLabar, Muzamal Hussain,Muhammad Sadeeq Ansarifor PP-197, Ch. Khalid JavedWarraich (PTI), Riaz AhmadNizami, Muhammad ZaheerIlyas, Imran Rasheed Sulahri,for PP–196, MakhdoomAbbas Akbar Moni Shah(PML– N), Sayed NazimHussain Shah (PPP) for PP–199.

*****The electricity load shed-

ding continued to disrupt rou-tine life in the city on Satur-day. The feeders in urban lim-its of Multan city are con-ducting an eight-hour shut-down and stretch beyond 14hours in rural limits of MEPCO(Multan Electric Power Com-pany). Sources said that thenational grid was facing se-vere shortage between de-mand and supply due to shut-down of major power plantsover fuel shortage.

*****A person Mukhtar

Ahmad Jhunbal was assas-sinated by his wife’s broth-ers and father in TajpurSandeela (Jurisdiction of Po-lice Station Sadar, Multan)area on March 27, 2013(Wednesday). Mukhtar’srelatives told to PakistanObserver that Mukhtar waskilled due to some family is-sues. An FIR has been regis-tered under sections 302, 324against Miseri and his sonsHayyat, Shoukat and Akramat Police Station Sadar. Po-lice said Akram had a crimi-nal record. No arrest in thisregard had been made yet.

*****Former City Nazim,

Multan District, Mian FaisalMukhtar on Saturday saidthat he will not have take partin the upcoming general elec-tions. Talking to the mediapersons at his residence thatdue to some reasons he willnot take part in the elections.

Lawyers strikeagainst murderMULTAN—Lawyers ob-served strike on Saturdayagainst the killing of a Su-preme Court lawyer inRawalpindi. They con-demned the murder ofChaudhry Muhammad Khanin Rawalpindi and expressedsolidarity with his family. 26gamblers held: Haram Gateand Shah Rukan-e-Alam po-lice claim to have arrested 26gamblers and recoveredstake money from their pos-session in separate raids.

According to police,Haram Gate police arrestedKamran, Ramazan, Altaf,Iqbal, Zulifqar, Ramazan,Ashiq, Allah Ditta, Mohib Aliand M Rizwan. Shah Rukan-e-Alam police arrested 16gamblers.—APP

5th, 8th classesresults announcedBASHIR AHMAD RAHMANI

HAFIZABAD—The result offifth and 8th class examina-tions held under the PunjabExamination Commission inFebruary last has been an-nounced by the EDO Educa-tion Hafizabad. MuhammadAdnan Nasir of Govt. HighSchool No. 2 stood firstamong all the candidates inMiddle examination by ob-taining 725 out of 800 markswhile Moez Saqib of DPSHafizabad bagged secondposition by securing 721Marks while Sara Azam ofSufi Foundation PublicSchool obtained third posi-tion by getting 720 marks.

Waleen Hassan of Govt.Primary Mauloo Chak, Anamof M.C Girls Primary SchoolNo. 4 Hafizabad and Privatecandidate Rabia Fayyazbagged first position jointlyby securing 519/600 marksamong the successful candi-dates of 5th class.Muhammad Rizwan ofMumtaz Academy MadhoraKalan bagged second posi-tion by securing 515 markswhile Syed Asad UllahBokhari of DPS Hafizabad se-cured third position by get-ting 513 marks.

According to RegistrarExamination MuhammadAbid Hussain, 12,946 stu-dents of 8th class appearedin 8th class, 8,504 were de-clared successful, showingpass percentage of 65.69while 19,223 students ap-peared in the 5th class exami-nation of which 8,488 weredeclared successful showingpass percentage of 44.55.

*****The incident of bike-

snatching, robberies anddacoities have also been in-creased in the district follow-ing the electioneering in thedistrict. According to officialsource, dacoits at three differ-ent places deprived the villag-ers of three motorcycles, cellphones, ATM Cards and thou-sands of rupees last night.

Umar Hayat, son ofMuhammad Nawaz was onway to his village Mochiwalawhen two armed bandits in-tercepted him and snatchedaway his bike. In another in-cident Syed MuzamalHussain of MohallahQadirabad was on way toTootra when two armed ban-dits intercepted him andsnatched away his bike, cellphone and cash amount ofRs. 35,000. According to yetanother report, three armeddacoits stormed into thehouse of Faisal.

BASHIR AHMAD RAHMANI

HAFIZABAD—Most of thepolitical parties have not yetawarded tickets to theirpotentional candidates, ac-cept PML-N which hasawarded ticket for NA-102 tooutgoing MNA Saira AfzalTarar, outgoing MPA MalikFayyaz Ahmad Awan, ex-Dis-trict President District PPP,Hafizabad, for PP-105, MianIntisar Hussain for NA-103,outgoing MPA Asad UllahArian for PP-106 and outgo-ing MPA Mian ShahidHussain Bhatti for NA-103.

The PML-Q has alsoawarded party ticket for NA-102 to its District President Ch.Mehdi Hassan Bhatti, Dr.Muzafar Ali Shiekh for PP-105,Rai Riasat Ali Kharal for PP-106, Syed Shoaib Shah for PP-

107 and outgoing MNA Ch.Liaquat Abbas Bhatti for NA-103. According to insiders,PML-Q leaders were also intouch with PTI high commandto get ticket for all the five con-stituencies but they were of-fered three seats.

According to a leader ofPML-Q Hafizabad, with thecondition of anonymity, ifthey succeeded in gettingtickets for all the five con-stituencies from PTI, thegroup would file their nomi-nation papers as PTI candi-dates, otherwise, they wouldsay good bye to PML-Q alsoand file their nomination pa-pers as Independent candi-dates on Sunday.

*****Acquisition of modern

education and technologywas ‘sine qua non’ for the

progress, stability and na-tional cohesion, declaredDCO Dr. Farah Masood heretoday. While addressing 16thFoundation Day and AnnualPrize Distribution of DPSHafizabad, she urged the stu-dents to concentrate on theirstudies as well as to take partis co-curricular activities tobrighten their career as wellas to come up to the expecta-tions of their parents.

*****DPO Hafizabad Gohar

Mushtaq Bhutta has warnedthat he would show zero tol-erance to corrupt and negli-gent officials. Addressingoffice-bearers of ConciliationCommittees of the district, hestressed upon them to usetheir good offices in makingconciliation among the par-ties in petty cases.

QUETTA: PML-N Provincial President Sardar Sanaullah Zehri addressing a Press conference.

No competition with Mengal for CM office: ZehriBalochistan EC to remain operative on holidays

Saira, Fayyaz bag PML-N tickets

Fresh Rs 2.29b upliftprojects okayed

Multan: Nomination papersfor 13 PA, 7 NA seats filed

HYDERABAD—Early age ofmarriage and low level ofeducation are the maincauses of domestic vio-lence against women, saida ‘Fact Sheet’ issued hereby Rutgers WPF on Satur-day. Rutgers WPF, an inter-national organization, hasconducted a quantitativesurvey in six districts of thecountry with the support ofPakistan Gender based Vio-lence Reproductive HealthNetwork (PGRN).

These partner organi-zations have conductedthe survey in Punjab - DeraGhazi Khan andMuzaffergarh, Sindh -Jacobabad and Kashmore

and Balochistan-Jafferabad and Naseerabad.According to the facts andfigures, a total of 4885women were interviewedfrom 26 urban and 124 ruralunion councils at theirhouseholds in the abovementioned districts.

The fact sheet revealsthat 61 percent of womencovered under this studywere children when they gotmarried as per internationaldefinition of UN conventionon the Right of the Child1990, 34 percent marriagewere settled before the ageof 16 which is against Mus-lim Family Laws Ordinance1961, 64 percent of women

have never been to school.In spite of all, more than

77 percent of the marriageswere settled under some kindof customary practices in-cluding Vanni, Swara, SangChatti, Badal, Bazo, WattaSatta, and Pait Likhai. Fiftyeight percent of these mar-riages are settled under ex-change marriages known asWatta Satta and Pait Likhai.Rutgers WPF said that earlymarriage and low educationare co-related due to which 70percent women got marriagesbefore the age of 16.

Meanwhile theSpeakers of a seminar on“Welfare of girls”, organisedby HANDS and other social

Early marriage, low edu main causes of violence against womenwelfare organisations atDeputy Commissioner’s Of-fice Matiari on Friday havedemanded amendment inChild Marriage Bill and mak-ing it more effective to pre-vent the child marriage in allsense.

They demanded the pro-tection of the rights of chil-dren and to convert the billinto a welfare bill for children.They also demanded com-plete ban on the marriage ofgirls having an age below 18years. General SecretaryHANDS Bilqees Rehmansaid that child marriage notonly affect the health of chil-dren, but pushes them inpsychological problems as

well. She said that child mar-riage has become a serioussocial issue of the countrythat needs much attention toget it resolved. She said thecoming generation of thecountry depends upon ahealthy mother which couldgive birth to healthy childrenfor a healthy and disciplinedsociety. She demanded forgiving severe punishment tothe parents, who are respon-sible for child marriage. Theother speakers said that inrural area not only child mar-riage is taking place but in-nocent girls are being soldout as compensation of thepersonal sins of the par-ents.—APP

BAHAWALPUR: A woman lawyer casting her vote during the elections of BahawalpurHigh Court Bar Association.

main open in holidays in or-der to facilitate candidates tosubmit their nominationforms. The candidates canalso submit their nominationforms during weekly off days,he said. Balochistan elec-tions candidates submittingforms: The candidates be-longing to different politicalparties and independentgroups have been continuingsubmitting their nominationforms with the offices of Elec-tion Commission Balochistan.

When contacted, officialsources in the EC Balochistantold APP here on Saturdaythat the candidates who havesubmitted their nomination

forms included ManzoorBaloch of Balochistan Na-tional Party, Liaquat AliBangulzai of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl, Navid Dahwar,Maulana Abdul Sattar of JUI-N, Hafiz Zahoor AhmedShahwani, Amir Jan Samalani,Abdul Qayyum, Mir AhmedChiltanwal, Asghar KhanAchakzai of Awami NationalParty, Maulana MuhammadHanif of JUI-N, MaulanaAbdul Rahim of JUI-F, AbdulMajid Khan Achakzai ofPashtoonkhawa Milli AwamiParty, Haji Nawaz Kakar ofJUI-F, Qahar Dan Wadan ofPkMAP, Zamarak Khan ofANP.—APP

LAHORE—The Punjab HealthDepartment has promotednine doctors of Post GraduateMedical Institute (PGMI) asassociate professor on regu-lar basis in Grade-19. The doc-tors who are promoted on thepost of associate professorincluded Dr Rafique AhmedBasharat (medicine), Dr AbdulHayye (ophthalmology), DrAfsar Ali Bhatti and DrMuhammad Zahid (surgery),Dr Naila Tariq and Dr FarrahYousaf (Obst & Gynae), Dr

Altaf Qadir Khan (psychiatry)and Dr Rozina Jaffer (Pathol-ogy). On the regularization oftheir services, the doctorshave been allowed to continuetheir duties on the presentplace of posting.

Meanwhile, office-bearersof Medical Teachers Associa-tion Prof Dr Israr Ahmed andProf Dr Sikandar Hayat Gondalcongratulated the doctors ontheir promotion. Offices ofDISCOs to remain open onSunday: Offices of all power

distribution companies(DISCOs) will remain open onSunday (March 31) till evening.

Federal Secretary Waterand Power, Sikandar Rai andWAPDA Chairman SyedRaghib Abbas Shah on Sat-urday notified that the officesof all power distributionscompanies will remain openon Saturday and Sunday(March 30 & 31) for clearenceof electricity dues of contest-ing candidates for the upcom-ing general elections.—APP

Nine doctors promotedas Associate Professors

20 notoriouscriminalsarrested

OUR CORRESPONDENT

QUETTA—The police dur-ing grand search operationarrested 20 notorious crimi-nals wanted in number ofcases and recovered armsfrom their possession. Ac-cording to details, more than600 police cops conductedtargeted search operation inKaley Nakhel, a suburb ofQuetta.

During the operation 20accused wanted in number ofcriminal cases including tar-get killing, kidnapping fromransom, murder, attempt tomurder and robberies weredetained. Police also claimedto have recovered arms fromthe possession of culpritsarrested. The nabbed cul-prits were shifted to undis-closed location for furtherinvestigation.

IRFAN ALIGI

KARACHI—Sindh Institute ofUrology and Transplantation(SIUT) organized a memorialevent “RememberingArdeshir” for the late re-nowned journalist, intellec-tual and philanthropist“Ardeshir Cowasjee” at SIUT.Rich glowing tributes werepaid to Cowasjee on his tre-mendous humanitarian activi-ties for Pakistan as a wholeand Karachi in particular.

SIUT Director Prof. AdibulHasan Rizvi while recalling thephilanthropy of late Cowasjeesaid that he was a real friendof SIUT and in 1993 donatedhaemodialysis machines inthe name of his wife. Subse-quently he donated an entirehepatitis B positive dedicatedhaemodialysis unit in thename of his mother Mucca

Ardeshir Cowasjeeremembered at SIUT

Cowasjee comprising of 24machines.

Prof. Rizvi further recalledsaying that Cowasjee contrib-uted maximally towards theSIUT lithotripsy unit by donat-ing 4 lithotripsy equipmentsfrom which thousands of pa-tients were getting free andquality stone treatment. An-other feather to his cap was hiscontribution of Angiographyequipment for the radiologyunit to enable SIUT for provid-ing a facility to thousands ofneedy and poor patients, headded. Prof. Rizvi informedthe audience that during thecampaign of deceased organdonation program, Cowasjeewhole heartily supported thecause and after proclamationof the concerned law he wasthe first person to sign hiswill for donating his organsafter his death.

Minister for action against cheating mafiaStaff Reporter

PESHAWAR—The Khyber PakhtunkhwaCaretaker Minister for Information, Edu-cation and Social Welfare, MossaratQadeem has called upon the chairmenof all the Boards of Intermediate andSecondary Education of KhyberPakhtunkhwa to work out a viable strat-egy for revamping and streamlining ofaffairs of their respective boards andmaking the exam system in line with theinternational standard so as to compete

the developed world effectively. This, she said, while chair-ing a meeting of the Chairmen of all the Boards of Interme-diate and Secondary Education (BISE) at Peshawar. Secre-tary Elementary and Secondary Education HumayyunKhan and Special Secretary Mussarat Hussain also at-tended the meeting. The Chairmen informed the ministerof the issues and problems of the boards in detail. TheEducation Minister said that after assuming the charge ofthe office, she was constantly receiving complaints againstthe educational boards and its poor paper marking sys-tem. She asked them to initiate action against those ele-ments who were earning bad name for the boards. Sheadded that eradication of cheating and mafia in exams wasa challenging task for them and they should come outagainst it forcefully. She continued, instead of traditionaland manual way of exams, they should focus on onlineexam system and introduced MCQs system like AETA.

UAF spring festivalFAISALABAD—Six-day Spring Festivalof University of Agriculture Faisalabad(UAF) will be concluded here on Sun-day (March 31, 2013). As the SpringFestival staged by University of Agri-culture Faisalabad (UAF) draws closerto its last day, tens of hundreds of lo-cals turned up in droves to have a de-light of the color of festivities. The eventbrought a rich blend of agricultural andcultural events including agricultural

exhibition, fancy bird show, pet show, greyhound races,tent pegging, farmer convention, conferences, alumni meetand cultural show etc. on the direction of UAF Vice Chan-cellor Prof Dr Iqrar Ahmad Khan. The festival is meant toprovide a platform to common persons and farming com-munity to interact with social as well agricultural experts. Ithelps not only to motivate the farming community aboutusing modern techniques but also transfer our rich culturein the young generation. Besides, it also becomes a placeof entertainment to get refuge from their monotonous rou-tine and showcase the skills of students in front of largegathering. The site of agri exhibition remained a source ofattraction for the agriculture lovers who came here to wit-ness the latest trends. As many as more than 80 stalls wereset up at the exhibition from the UAF Departments anddifferent renowned agricultural groups. At the bird show,more than 2,000 birds are displayed of 15 spices with morethan 50 varieties in each species.—APP

AIOU, TUF to coop in health sciencesFAISALABAD—Allama Iqbal Open Uni-versity (AIOU) will establish bilateralrelations with The University ofFaisalabad (TUF) in health sciences dis-ciplines. A spokesman of TUF told hereon Saturday that Prof Dr Nazir AhmedSangi Vice Chancellor Allama Iqbal OpenUniversity Islamabad visited The Uni-versity of Faisalabad (TUF). During ameeting with Prof Dr Abdul KarimBaloch, Pro Rector TUF, and Prof Dr

Abdul Majeed, Director Quality Enhancement Cell, he wasbriefed about The University of Faisalabad Campuses,University Medical & Dental College, Madinah TeachingHospital and other welfare projects running under the aus-pices of Madinah Foundation. Later, Dr Nazir Sangi alsovisited departmental labs of University Campus and vari-ous departments of Madinah Teaching Hospital. He ap-preciated state-of-the-art infrastructure and standard ofeducation at TUF. He also showed keen interest in estab-lishing bilateral relations between the two universities indifferent academic disciplines, particularly health sciences.UAF to start short courses: Department of ContinuingEducation, University of Education Faisalabad (UAF) willstart 31 short courses from April 1. A spokesman for theuniversity said on Saturday the courses include spokenEnglish (evening), computer course (evening).—APP

SARGODHA—Many heavy-weights including former min-isters filed nomination pa-pers for five National Assem-bly and 11 Punjab Assemblyseats on Saturday. The can-didates who filed nominationpapers included former Min-ister Anwar Ali Cheema PML,Shams Naveed Cheema JI,Sardar Ahsan Raza PTI,Zulfiqar Ali Bhatti PML-N,Muhammad Ali Gujjar PML-N and Mumtaz AhktarKahloon PTI for NA-67,former State MinisterTasneem Ahmad QureshiPPPP, Ch. Hamid HameedPML-N and Dr ArshadShahid JI for NA-66, ZubairAhmad Gondal JI, Ch GhiasAhmad Mela PML and ChMohsin Shah Nawaz RanjhaPML-N for NA-65.

They also included Syedur Rehamh, Niaz Ahmad (In-dependents), Dr MubasharAhmad Gujjar JI, Ch NadeemAfzal Chann PPPP, Pir AminulHasnaat PML-N and HaroonEhsan Piracha PTI for NA-64whereas Mian Noor HayatKalyar PTI, Shafir ur RehmanMQM, Sardar Shafqat HayatBaloch PML-N, Malik NazirSobhe PML-N, Sardar AliQurnain PML-N, former Min-ister Syed Nusrat Ali ShahPPPP, Ch. Mumtaz AkhtarKahloon PTI, Ali AsgharLahri Independent, SyedMehboob Ali Shah Indepen-dent for NA-68.

Ch Kamil Shumail GujjarPML-N, Ahmad Sher PPPP,Faisal Farooq PML for PP-35,Rana Munawar Ghous PML-N, Haji Ahmad JI, ImranMehdi Gujjar PTI, Faisal

Javed Ghumman Indepen-dent, Shah Muhammad AliIndependent, Abdul RazzakGujjar Independent for PP-36,Shafqat Hayat Baloch PML-N, Ali Asghar Lahri,Muhammad Akram Indepen-dents, Nizam ud Din SialviPML-N for PP-37, MalikBashir Ahmad Advocate JI,Omarzadi Tiwana PML-N,Atif Hussain Meken PML,Mian Munir Hussain QureshiIndependent and IftiukharGondal PTI for PP-38, ChAamer Sultan Cheema PML,Munir Hussain Gujjar PML-N, Tariq Gujjar PPP, ChMubashir Hussain Indepen-dent and Malik Shoaib Awanfor PP-32 also filed papers.

Ch. Abdul RazzakDhaloon PML-N, ShahadHassan Qureshi PPPP, MianIzhar ul Haq JI, Ali Asif BaggaPTI and Hafiz Abdul Rauf In-dependent for PP-33, Dr.Liaquat Ali PML-N, MansoorHayat Luk PTI, TabraizL-N,Nadeem Waris Warriach PPPP,Aurang Zeb Butt PML-N,Malik Hehmood Hussain JI,Ch. Ejaz Ahmad Kahloon PTIand Dr. Nadia Aziz Indepen-dent filed papers for for PP-34.

Mian Ahmad Sher Sipra JI,Awais Aslam MidhyanaPPPP, Muhammad AslamMidhyana PPPP, Manazir AliRanjha PML-N for PP-31,Khaliq Dad Padhyar PPPP, ChNasir Ali PTI, Rafaqat AliWarraich JI, Shahzadi Luk In-dependent for PP-29 andRana Khursheed JI, MukhtarAhmad Bhart PML-N, HassanPiracha PTI and Zobia RubabPPPP have filed nominationpapers for PP-28.—APP

Free eye campHYDERABAD—The DeputyCommissioner HyderabadAgha Shahnawaz Babar hascalled upon the philanthro-pists and well to do peopleto come forward and gener-ously donate to charity or-ganization so that poor andneedy persons could getmaximum benefits from wel-fare projects.

He made the appeal whileaddressing a ceremony in con-nection with three- day longannual free eye camp of Al-Umeed Lions Club here atAnti-Tuberculosis HouseLatifabad Unit-6 on Saturday.

The Chairman Al-Umeed Lions Club ShakirMemon briefed the DeputyCommissioner about thewelfare projects being car-ried out by is organization.He further informed that outof 817 patients who wereexamined in the camp, thesurgery of 210 patients wascarried out by eminent sur-geons.—APP

SHEIKHUPURA—At leastthree persons including twochildren and a woman diedwhile 16 others scorched dueto burst of CNG cylinder of apassenger van here late onFriday. According to details,the incident occurred inMandi Jabharan when CNGcylinder of a Sheikhupurabound passenger van com-ing from Hafizabad suddenlyexploded.

The vehicle caught firedue to petrol tank installedwith the CNG cylinder result-ing in death of three people

3 perish in CNG cylinder blastYouth killed in road mishap

including two children and awoman. The police and res-cue personnel rushed to thescene of incident and shiftedthe 16 people with burnwounds to District Head-quarters (DHQ) HospitalSheikhupura.

It should be mentionedthat CNG explosion of cylin-ders are common in Pakistanas drivers don’t care abouttheir quality and overhaulingafter their guaranteetimeframe expires. The policeregistered a case against thedriver of the passenger van

and started investigations.Sargodha: A youth died

while two others including awoman were injured in car-motorbike collision in Bhalwalpolice limits on Saturday. Po-lice said Muhammad Aameralong with brother Yasir andmother Nizaran Bibi of Chak62 NB was riding a motorbikewhen a speeding car hit themnear Chak 13 NB. As a result,Aamer died on the spot whilehis mother and brother wereinjured. The car driver fled.Police have registered acase.—INP

STAFF REPORTER

PESHAWAR—Pakistan Mus-lim League-N (PML-N) andJamaat-e-Islami (JI) decidedto share candidate’s prioritylist to finalize seat adjustmentfor general elections 2013 inKhyber Pakhtunkhwa. Thedecision has been taken dur-ing a meeting of JI ProvincialAmeer Prof. MuhammadIbrahim Khan and PMLNCentral General SecretaryIqbal Zafar Jagra here on Sat-urday.

The meeting besidesother was attended by JIProvincial General Secre-tary Shabir Ahmad Khan,Provincial Naib AmeerMushtaq Ahmad Khan,PMLN Peshawar PresidentAbdus Sattar Khali l and

Col. Rtd. Sher Afgan Khan.The meeting decided thatinstead of reviewing all na-tional and provincial seatsamong negotiat ion teamsof both the parties, sharingof candidate’s priority listfor seat adjustment in theprovince would get fruitfulresults as there was shorttime left for the polls.

However, negotiationteams of both the partieswould announce final seatadjustment in province afterscrutiny.

Meawhile, it is reportedfrom Chinoit a businessmanturned politician twiceelected as independentMNA from Chinoit, QaiserAhmad Shaikh, joined thePakistan Muslin LeagueNawaz. He made this an-

nouncement among thebusiness community hailingfrom Chinoit at a dinnerhosted in honour of formerchief minister PunjabMuhammad Shahbaz Sharif.

Apart from ShahbazSharif, Chairman Pak-IndoCCI,SM Munir, PresidentFaisalabad Chamber ofCommerce and Industry,Zahid Aslam, former presi-dents LCCI, Anjum Nisar,Irfan Qaisar, former Presi-dent KCCI Anjum Nisar,former Deputy SpeakerPunjab Assembly RanaMashood, former MPAsMaulana Ilyas Chinoiti ,Maulana Rehmat Ullah andseveral businessmen fromShaikh clan from Chinoitwere also present on theoccasion.

KP PML-N, JI strikeNA seats bargain

Nomination papersfiled in Sargodha

42 candidatessubmit papers inTalagang Tehsil

SHAFFAAT MALIK

TALAGANG—Forty-two candi-dates have submitted theirnomination papers for electionsin Talagang for NA-61, PP-22and PP-23. The process of fil-ing nomination papers wouldend today. Ch Pervaiz Ellahi,Sardar Mumtaz Tamman, SardarMansoor Hayat, Malik ZahoorAnwar Awan, Col (r) SultanSurkhro, Malik MuhamamdAyub, Ch. Amir along withdozens other contenders havefiled their nomination papers inReturning Officer’s OfficeTalagang so far.

The PML-N, PML-Q andJI have already announcedtheir candidates for TehsilTalagang but PTI’s voters arestill waiting for the name ofticket holders from thoseconstituencies. Independentgroup of Sardar GhulamAbbas, former District Nazimhas announced to supportPML-Q in all constituenciesof the area and it can play avital role in coming elections.The NA-61, PP-23 and PP-22has more than 0.4 millionvotes. According to detailsthe total number of votes forthese three constituency are4,38,624. The total number ofpolling stations for thoseconstituencies will be 370while 1053 polling booths willbe there to facilitate peopleto cast their votes. NA-61consists of 33 union coun-cils in total, 23 UCs fromTehsil Talagang, 8 fromTehsil Chakwal and 2 fromTehsil Kalar Kahar, while PP-22 and PP-23 consists of 16and 17 UCs respectively.KANDHKOT: A view of sewerage water accumulated in front of a school.

PESHAWAR: PPP-P leader from Bannu Saeeda Yasmeen submiting her nominationpapers for women reserved seats to returning officer for forthcoming general electionson 11th May 2013.

BANNU: People of Mirakhel Tribe demanding for release of their abducted men.

MULTAN—Vice Chairman ofPakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf(PTI), Shah MahmoodQureshi, Saturday said hewould prove in the upcom-ing election the Sindh cardwas no longer with the Paki-stan Peoples Party as it hadcreated severe deprivationamong people of the prov-ince.

Talking telephonicallyto APP, the PTI seniorleader said he had submit-ted nomination papers forNA-208 (Umar Kot-I) to ex-pose the popularity of thelast government. He said hehad entered Sindh politicsto change it. He said he hadbeen a staunch supporterof the federation andwanted to introduce the

spirit in the politics ofSindh.

He said he would con-test election on three con-stituencies including NA-150, NA-148 (Multan) andNA-208 (Umar Kot). He said

except leaders whose con-stituencies were confirmed,the PTI had not finalisedthe list of candidates to takepart in election. Only a spe-cial board will shortlist can-didates, he concluded.

Earlier, talking to a pri-vate tv news channel dur-ing a talk-show PakistanTehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) ShahMehmood Qureshi said thatPTI cheif Imran khanpointed out the securityreservations while meetingwith caretaker Chief Minis-ter of Punjab Najam Sethiand he admitted that thesecurity threats exist andgovernment will overcomethese challenges.

Qureshi said that anypolitical party can’t afford

such arrangement alone tomeet the security riskswithin the limited resources,especially PTI which havevery limited resources.

All political partiesshould aware the candi-dates about security pre-cautionary measures be-sides following the cod ofconduct, he said. Respond-ing to a question, Qureshisaid there are few candi-dates who can afford bulletproof vans during electioncampaign while majority ofthe candidates can’t affordthis. Conduct of peacefulpolls will be a great chal-lenge for government, lawenforcing agencies and allthe political parties, headded.—APP

Sindh card no longer bargains chip with PPP

ISLAMABAD—Pakistan Me-teorological Department onSaturday forecast dry weatherin most areas of the countriesduring next two days. How-ever, light rain with thunder-storm is expected inIslamabad, Rawalpindi,Sargodha, Malakand, Hazara,Kohat, Bannu, Peshawar di-visions, Kashmir & Gilgit-Baltistan and Hazara Divi-sions during next 24 hours.

According to the Met of-fice‚ temperature recorded onSaturday morning in Islamabadwas 14 degree centigrade‚Lahore 17‚ Karachi 24‚Peshawar 19‚ Quetta 8‚ Gilgit12‚ Murree 11 andMuzaffarabad 13 degree centi-

Dry weather persists, lightrain likely in some areas

grade. The Multan Met officehas forecast partly cloudyweather for the city and its sub-urbs during the next 24 hours.

On Saturday, the maximum andminimum temperatures were re-corded as 26.4 and 13.0 degreescentigrade, respectively.

Humidity was recordedas 89 percent at 8 a.m. and 39percent at 5 p.m. Fair/partlycloudy weather.—APP

PPP completesconstruction

projects in KPSTAFF REPORTER

PESHAWAR—Speaker KhyberPakhtunkhwa Assembly,Kiramatullah Khan said thatconstruction of Pir BalaChowk to Pir Qila Road withan estimated cost of Rs 100million would benefit stu-dents and people from everywalk of life in the area. Theroad is being constructed withthe collaboration of JICA.

Addressing Parents-DayCeremony at Govt. PrimarySchool, Hakeem Khan villagehere on Saturday, the provisionof basic facilities to the studentsand teachers were essential forthe promotion of education,therefore, he recalled that thedemocratic government in KPhas spent four percent of GDPand time scale for teacherswhich were indicative of thePPP’s friendly education policy.

Possible foodinsecurity in Pakistan!PAKISTAN consists of areas that were considered as food bas

ket of the Subcontinent and that is why it is rather astonishingto hear that the country might face severe food insecurity in the

decades to come. Speakers and experts at the launch of an interna-tional report in Lahore feared that the country would turn food inse-cure by 2030 and therefore, it needs to pay attention towards swiftimplementation of agri-biotech applications.

Agriculture is mainstay of Pakistan’s economy as it accounts for21% of the GDP and together with agro-based products fetches 80%of the country’s total export earnings. More than 48% of the labourforce is engaged in this sector. Though at the moment Pakistan’sachievement in the agriculture sector was not so bad as it is exportingcotton, wheat, rice and sugar besides fruit and vegetables. But it is tobe noted that contribution of agriculture to the GDP was 53% in 1947which has shrunk to just 21% and the country might face food short-ages because of fast growing population. Therefore, the country willhave to shift to modern agricultural implements, biotechnology andfocus on per acre yield. Neighboring India and Bangladesh haveshown significant improvement in their agriculture sector whileChina is growing padi crops in Gobi desert yet Pakistan is still rely-ing on perennial canal system of irrigation. Research and develop-ment is key to progress and there is need to grow crops that needless water, less fertilizer and give more yield. We have a dedicatedresearch entity Pakistan Agricultural Research Council besides fiveuniversities but the research carried out there has hardly reached tothe farmers. Pakistan is also the 4th largest producer of milk in theworld but despite that we are importing dry milk, which speaks vol-umes about mess in the agriculture sector. To propel agriculture ofthe country into 21st century, the quality of technical skills and man-agement of agricultural manpower must improve. We must plan nowto avert a food catastrophe in the years to come.

US public riseagainst drones

AS the United States is persisting with its provocative policy ofdrone strikes, peace activists in the US are starting a month of

protests this week to mobilize American public opinion against droneattacks. The organizers say they plan to ‘shock people’ into action againstthe unmanned aircraft and during protests they would target militarybases, universities and companies involved in the drone warfare.

There is absolutely no justification or logic for drone strikes thatnot only constitute violation of sovereignty of other countries includ-ing Pakistan but also result in human rights violations and huge col-lateral damage. The plan for month-long protests in Washington DC,Atlanta, Philadelphia, Honolulu, San Francisco, Sacramento, Min-neapolis, Des Moines and other states would surely help raise aware-ness against drones that are being used by the United States as themain weapon during so-called war on terror. It is strange that a coun-try that claims to be champion of the human rights should itself breachsovereignty of other countries and kill innocent people. There is alsoanother aspect of the issue – every drone strike triggers more resent-ment, violence and anti-Americanism. The UN Human Rights Coun-cil is already investigating the issue and hopefully its report wouldsensitize the international public opinion against such attacks. Wealso believe that Pakistan might not be colluding with the UnitedStates on this account yet the fact remains that it has also not taken upthe issue in right earnest with other members of the global commu-nity and at the relevant international fora. At a time, when the UnitedStates and its allies are planning to leave the region next year, Wash-ington should review the policy without losing further time as it pro-duces more ill-will than addressing the challenge of terrorism.

Let there be no“No Go” areas

THE Supreme Court has directed the Police and Rangers to eliminate the no-go areas in Karachi by utilising all resources by April

4. The order by the Apex Court would give a sense of satisfaction tothe citizens who had been suffering since long and not getting anyrespite from incidents of daily killings, extortion and kidnappings.

There are no two opinions that the criminal elements have estab-lished State within State and different political parties made the lawenforcement institutions helpless as the outlaws enjoyed political um-brella. Manghopir, Lyari, Sohrab Goth, Shanti Nagar, Dalmia, Korangi,Liaquatabad, New Karachi are some of the areas where the armed gangsenjoy full control and police due to political interference failed to es-tablish its control. According to the reports, there are 13 no-go areas inKarachi because of the presence of militants or gangsters and 29 havebecome no-go areas for people of a particular ethnicity at the time ofethnic violence. In fact Karachi is not an exception as there are un-countable no go areas in other parts of the country including interiorSindh, Balochistan and FATA. Out laws, landlords and sardars haveestablished their private jails but police officials having all the infor-mation do not take action due to fear of either to be posted out orkilled at the hands of the mighty people. In other cities includingCapital Islamabad, large number of barriers on roads give the im-pression that the country was at war and otherwise too they are aneye soar and be removed forthwith. We expect that the orders of theSupreme Court would be implemented with all earnest and city wouldbe cleared of the “No Go” areas as the law enforcement agencies arenow having freedom to act without political interference.

Dimensions of conflict — Pakistan

People who are muchtoo sensitive todemand of cripplesthat they run racesask of the poor thatthey get up and actjust like everyoneelse in society.

Asia’sgreat

rivalry

China’s state-run media reported this week the purchase of 24 of Russia’s most

advanced fighter in production, theSu-35, as a capstone to new leaderXi Jinping’s visit to Moscow lastweek. But there’s something oddabout the announcement. The dealwas supposedly signed before thesummit, but it wasn’t revealed inMoscow. And even now the Rus-sian government remains silent,while some Russian media deny thesale was agreed. The confusion isa reminder that Sino-Russian re-lations are never as warm as thebear hugs would suggest. Behindthe rhetoric of strategic partner-ship, however, the two countriesare rivals for influence in Centraland East Asia. Russia is a greatpower in denial about its declineand China’s relative strength. Hav-ing been the elder brother for de-cades, inspiring fear in MaoZedong that drove him into thearms of the US, Moscow now wor-ries that the vast resources of itsunder populated far east will even-tually fall into Chinese hands.

The Su-35 deal encapsulatesthe mistrust nicely. Russia still hasmilitary technology that Chinawants, but it hasn’t sold a majorweapons system to its neighbour ina decade. That’s due in part toBeijing’s broken promises not tocopy them. Military aircraft facto-ries in Shenyang have producedmultiple versions of the Su-27 andits descendants, including the J-15carrier-based fighter that is in tri-als aboard China’s first aircraft car-rier. When the Su-35 negotiationssurfaced last year, Moscow held outfor a purchase of 48 planes,whereas Beijing wanted to buyfour. If this week’s reports are cor-rect, the two met in the middle with24. That order is needed to keepproduction lines running while newstealth planes are in development,since key potential customers inLibya, Syria and Venezuela are his-tory. One reason the sale can goforward may be that China is nolonger interested in copying the Su-35. It is designing its own stealthfighters such as the J-20, now inthe prototype phase. The Su-35 ismore of a stopgap to bolster China’sforces in the meantime.

Another reason to think the Su-35 sale is less significant than it ap-pears involves India. Delhi has usu-ally had preferential access to Rus-sian technology ahead of Beijing,yet it lacks planes as sophisticatedas the Su-35. But since India andRussia are cooperating on the de-velopment of the next generationstealth jets, signifying greater mu-tual trust, Delhi can live with thistemporary disadvantage. The mostimportant detail may be how manyspare engines the Russians haveagreed to sell. The design and pro-duction of high performance jetengines are key technologies thatChina hasn’t mastered, and thereis speculation that Beijing wants theSu-35 engines to power its stealthfighters. It’s an open question howlong this gap will persist, but Rus-sia will try to milk it for all it’sworth. Moscow also still has someleverage over Beijing on energy. Itagreed to double oil exports, whichwill reduce China’s dependence onMiddle East oil. Sea lanes throughthe Indian Ocean and the MalaccaStrait would be vulnerable to clo-sure by the US in a conflict, whichis why Beijing is willing to effec-tively pay up front through loans.But in energy too, Russia’s poweris dwindling. Negotiations on theexport of natural gas are still stalledover price, which is no wondergiven the effect of the shale gasrevolution on the world market.

China may want to diversifyits sources of energy, but it has noqualms about playing Gazprom offagainst other suppliers. Moscowand Beijing would like to portraytheir relationship as stronger thanever due to the renewed US focuson Asia. But underneath the fa-cade, their rivalry will only growmore intense as China continuesto rise. That may one day pushVladimir Putin’s successors intothe same position as Mao Zedong,looking for closer ties with the USto manage the threat from theirmore powerful neighbour.— The Wall Street Journal

MEDIA WATCH

Michael Harrington—US socialist

The state of Pakistan is in a total anarchy. There is breakdown in governance and vir-

tual financial collapse due to ineffi-ciency and corruption. Corruptionhas many faces, beside financial,intellectual and in the management.Hundreds of thousands of politicalworkers have been inducted intovarious state run organizations/de-partments making them absolutelynon viable entities. The corruptionis to an extent that hundreds of Ki-los of explosive material pass fromvarious check posts with out anyhindrance. Criminals and terroristshave made in roads in to law en-forcement. Criminals know that nobody can touch them make thembold and dangerous. Over all, itlooks the nation is losing its moor-ings. Every institution seems to bein a state of virtual paralyses. Thesociety by and large is in depressionand suffer uncertainty.

The milieu is a result of the pro-longed neglect and vision. All themajor pillars of policy formulationsuffered. The planners failed to cor-rect moral, social, educational, eco-nomic and political directions. Thepolitical parties on either sides, con-tinue to safe guard their own vestedinterests leading to utter polarizationin the polity. Average citizen is acannon fodder. Culture of intoler-ance has quagmirated the fabric ofthe society. Violence breads vio-lence. Common citizen believes thatno justice is attainable from any in-stitution unless it resorts to violence.Result is strikes, Dharnas, breakageof property, burning, looting andkillings. It is a natural psychologi-

TTP’s un-Islamic practices

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Sunday Magazine

Sadia Zahid MalikEditor

Ph: 2852027-8, Ext: 116Email: magazinesocialdiary@hotmail.com

In recent years, militants of theTehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan(TTP) and its affiliated outfits

conducted terror-activities such assuicide attacks, ruthless beheadingsof tribesmen, assaults on securitypersonnel and prominent figures in-cluding Shias. Besides blowing chil-dren schools, while attacking the fe-male teachers in order to deny edu-cation to girls, they also targetedmosques, Imambargahs, mausole-ums, and disgraced dead bodies.Their nefarious acts resulted intokillings of several persons in Paki-stan. They have accelerated theiranti-social, undemocratic and un-Is-lamic practices to sabotage thedemocratic process and the forth-coming elections.

When the Supreme Court of Pa-kistan, armed forces, political and re-ligious parties including media andcivil society remained keen to seedemocracy, flourishing in the coun-try by favouring the elections, TTTmilitants started propagating that de-mocracy is western system of gov-ernment which is against Islam. Forthe purpose, recently, a leaflet wasdistributed by the TTP-led Pasban-e-Shariat Organisation in NorthWaziristan Agency to reject the demo-cratic system in FATA, while propa-gating negative notions like as to“Why Democracy is Forbidden forTribes.” The aim is to thwart the pro-cess of elections and create chaoticorder in FATA. Meanwhile, TTPspokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan saidthat militant group was withdrawingits offer of peace talks with the gov-

ernment. He also directed thepeople to stay away from pollswhich were only serving theinterests of infidels and en-emies of Islam. It is notablethat after passing through vari-ous forms of governments

such as monarchy, dictatorship, Com-munism etc., western countries estab-lished the democratic system, as itempowers people to govern throughtheir elected representatives, and makedecisions as agreed by the majority.Despite it, the opposition is free tooppose any decision of the ruling party.In case of any violation of the consti-tution or democratic norms, the op-position party can go to the court. Infact, it is a representative systemwhich is based upon equality of allthe people, ensuring enforcement ofrule of law through an independentjustice. Based upon the system of ac-countability, it provides justice toall—majority and minority elementsof the country. Nothing is forcibly im-posed on the political will of the peoplewho fully enjoy the freedom of thoughtand action. It is due to these merits thatdemocratic system is widely popularin the world.

While Islam is a religion of uni-versal application, as it emphasisespeace, democracy, moderation andhuman rights including tolerance ofpolitical groups, religious communi-ties and sects which are in minorityin a country. The Constitution of1973 which was unanimouslyadopted, clearly states that Pakistanis basically a democracy guided bythe Islamic principles and values—no law would be made contrary tothe Holy Qur’an and Sunnah. Nota-bly, the Holy Prophet Muhammad(PBUH) in his sermon at HajjatulWida issued directions for protectionof life, property and dignity of thewhole mankind. The sermon became

a charter of democracy which wasincluded in the constitutions of thewestern elected governments in oneway or the other.

While addressing the ConstituentAssembly on August, 11 1947,Quaid-i-Azam who wanted Pakistanas a democratic state, said that he didnot want Pakistan to be a theocraticstate. He wanted Pakistan to be a lib-eral, secular and progressive statewhere both Muslims and non-Mus-lims were treated as citizens of equalstatus. Besides, Islam respectswomen, while democracy also ad-vocates the same. In fact, democ-racy does not evaporate respect forelders of a tribe or family and theprocess empowers the people tomake their own rules for gover-nance. Diversified people and reli-gious scholars (Ulemas) participatein the system which does not excludeor discriminate any one on basis ofcaste, creed and sect. It does not de-stroy the established cultural normsand tribal system. It makes policeand security forces answerable toelected members, making the tribalelders more powerful.

Democratic system does not pro-hibit the religious parties or tribes-men to participate in elections. Is-lamic laws can be implementedthrough a system of governance,hence, elections are essential for plac-ing the elected representatives tomake rules and govern in any part ofthe country. Laws of Sharia (IslamicJurisprudence) can best be put topractice through democratic systemwhich does not make us un-Islamicor anti-Sharia. Pakistan has to movealong with the demands of moderntime. Therefore, periodic reinterpre-tation of Islamic teachings in the lightof inventions and discoveries is es-sential so that it can offer inspirationto all the people at all times. Such

cal reaction to every happening. 1947was the culmination of the efforts ofthe Muslims of India. It was Iqbal’svision and political success of Jinnah.Drawing room intellectuals mostlyobsessed by Indian Media, writersand glamour today create confusionin Pakistani society raising questionmark on Two Nation Theory. Tothem, it got drowned in 1971 in theBay of Bengal. It is the line Indianscholars intellectuals and politicianspropagate on media.

After the creation of Bangladesh,Hindu majority desired merger ofEast Paksitan with India in whichthey failed due to international pres-sure. Bangladesh has a secular con-stitution but the Muslims ofBangladesh, time and again, provedthat they are an Islamic entity. It ispertinent so called intellectuals shouldread the Indian authors and speciallythe writings of Nehru, Vallu BhaiPatel and founders of RSS on thequestion of Hindu Muslim unity.Nehru, lamented that their forefathersfailed to indianise the muslims.Whereas, the RSS founders stronglyadvocate Muslim can be tolerated assubject but not as a part of commu-nity. This sentiment is not restrictedto couple of decades it has its foun-dation going back to over thousandof years. Every new entrants into In-dian sub continent was absorbed andindianised, wrongly called Hindu.Hindu is only a word (disfigured fromSindhu adopted by Persian invaders)and not a religion.

They may be Greeks, Persian,huns or others except the Muslims.Muslims and Hindu lived together asRulers and subjects and not as a inte-grated community. Post 1947, theconflict in Kashmir, killings of mil-lions at the time of migration andholding on to Pakistan shares of as-sets to ensure that the new born state

collapses within six months (Patel inCentral Executive Committee meet-ing on approving of partition plan).It is the resilience of Pakistanis theyweathered the onslaught. The lead-ership of Jinnah and others were dedi-cated politicians. They earnestlyworked to strengthen the new coun-try. The rot started, soon after Quaid.Our leadership not only fell to themechanizations of the foreign pow-ers. The greed and corruption com-menced with settlement claims, It haspenetrated the very skin of PakistanSociety. Corruption is graduated asart of Democracy.

Present scenario is depressing,yes it is the resilience of the Pakistanination that it withstood all odds. Theblame game is the norm of the day.Politicians and political parties notonly nurture the terrorists group andare still not ready to jointly condemnand combat them. The responsibilityis broad based across the board. Theresult is inter and intra polarizationin the every segment of the society,between religious groups – institu-tions and politicians, inter institutionsand socio economic strata. It culmi-nates into stress, irritation and leadto mob violence and in tolerance.Over and above there is massive for-eign funding in FATA (in the nameof Islam & Jihad) in Balochistan (inthe name of rights of depressed) topolarize Pakistan the way it was donepre 1971 East Pakistan.

Elements in Balochistan (lessthen 2%) of population of provinceare promised heaven on earth by for-eign fund managers. Democracyeven in worst form is the only routefor the nation to rebuild its fractiousstructure. Rule of law and pluggingcorruption is the key. It may take awhile but first step is vital. West Min-ister style democracy gifted to us bythe colonial rulers has failed to pro-

duce results. Majority bulldoze de-cisions. The British developed andmaintained it in eight hundred years.It is not prevalent any where in theworld except in the former coloniesof British Raj. Each country has aform of government and the consti-tution suited to states objectives,culture and psyche. The French,Germans, Americans, European andRussia all are democracies. WestMinister style democracy funda-mentally allow majority rule electedeven on minimal turnover and su-perficial majority. Elite rule throughits brute force.

Typical issue today is thelegacy of the post colonial conti-nuity of rule. It is a perverted rela-tionship between state and itspeople. Majority represent not anideology but religion and ethnicity.See the unity of the politicians, onthe question of Article 62 and 63,honest implementation would de-bar them from power, hence, nobody wants to get it implemented.All the amendments in the consti-tution which have been made in thelast couple of years are tostrengthen the Status Quo. With 40million bogus votes, now removedfrom the electoral list, in the lastelection, only 40% going for thevoting, majority parties at best couldclaim 13 to 14% of the representa-tion. Still they claim to represent 180million. The continuity of depressionamongst people manifest into protestsinitially and ultimately to anarchy. Toinitiate change, rebuilding of trust,reforms in the system of government,electoral reforms and strengtheningrevival of civil services will ensurebetter governance. Pluralism andtolerance is the key.—The writer, a Brigadier (Retd),is Defence & political analyst andveteran of 1965 and 1971 wars.

movement is called Ijtihad, whichcould provide new perceptions to Is-lam in accordance with the changedworld vision. While condemningthe TTP insurgents’ inhuman activi-ties, more than 60 Islamic scholarsrecently clarified in their joint fatwa(edict) and separate statements that“killing of innocent people, targetkillings and suicide bombings in-cluding sectarianism are against thespirit of Islam…the terrorists’ self-adopted interpretation of Islam wasnothing but ignorance and digres-sion from the actual teachings of thereligion. They elaborated that Islamdoes not forbid women’s education.

Nevertheless, Islam considerskilling one innocent person equal tomurdering the entire humanity,while Jihad is a sacred obligation,but its real spirit needs to be under-stood clearly, as murdering innocentwomen and children is not Jihad.These Taliban and their banned af-filiated groups are defaming Islamand are weakening Pakistan. TheseTTP related terrorists who have beencarrying out ferocious attacks, alsotake pride in claiming the responsi-bility for the same. Now, peoplefrom all segment of life and major-ity of politicians want that a hand-ful of terrorist elements must not beallowed to dictate their agenda andto impose their self-perceived ide-ology on the majority of Pakistanis.Nonetheless, TTP militants whohave no sense of compassion andbenevolence are acting upon anti-social, undemocratic and un-Islamicpractices. The right hour has comethat Pakistan’s media, politiciansand leaders of religious parties in-cluding security forces must showpractical unity against these zealotswho seek to create anarchy in thecountry to accomplish their self-motivated designs.

UTILITYBILLS

CANDIDATE

Tariq KhalilEmail: bibojee1@ghandhara.com.pk

Sajjad ShaukatEmail: sajjad_logic@yahoo.com

Voice of the People

The Cyprus government is pushing ahead with its EU backedlevy plan on bank deposits de-

spite protests and public outcry de-manding ‘don’t touch my money’.The President of Cyprus had de-fended plan for the greater good ofthe country and EU. The politicalexperts have criticized the levy andthe capital control putting restrictionson accountholders a dangerous trend.The wealthy Russians ($31bn esti-mated deposits) are now moving theirmoney from Cyprus. Cypriot heistmay have pouched golden egg but inthe process slaughtered the goose.The financial experts have rejectedthe solution to overcome Europe’seconomic crisis.

Cherry picking will not revive theEU economy. The troika (Cyprusgovernment, the EU and the IMF)wants to make Cyprus a test case forrest of Europe. The success in Cypruswill not guarantee similar results inother EU member states. Primarily,Cyprus was a tax haven and the ma-jority of account holders were for-eigners. The same policy cannot beapplied to UK, Spain, Italy or othermore powerful EU member states.Brussels and the Central Bank ofEurope are using double standards.They are sacrificing weak economiesto save stronger economies under thelogic of ‘trickledown effect’ where

Cyprus: Don’t touch my money

Let electionsbe on time

HASNAIN ALI BANANI

These days, people are asking onlyone question: will the elections beheld in time or not? The specula-tions over elections delay are be-ing discussed on TV talk shows andeach has its own slanting view onthis matter. The answer to the otherquestion, about who will benefitfrom the delay, is not so obvious.Everybody is just making wildguesses and is accusing every partyand person under the sun.

Some analysts are pointing afinger at the US as well. All theseanalyses are based on lack of anyconcrete evidence. We must refrainfrom shifting blame on foreign in-volvement in our affairs. It is justpresumptive of us. We are readingtoo much into this matter. Consid-ering the deteriorating law and or-der situation in the country,rumours are being spread. The gov-ernment and the election commis-sion has assured the people that theelections will be held on time butsome miscreants are disrupting thepolitical process. They do not be-lieve in democracy and are express-ing their discontent.

It will be a historic day for thepeople of Pakistan. It is hoped thatthis would set a trend for our po-litical process to move in a posi-tive direction. This will strengthenthe democratic system. Both theelection commission and the in-terim government will be respon-sible for holding free and fair elec-tions. Clearly, the movers and shak-ers, outsiders and entrenched par-ties would like to destabilize thecountry to postpone or delay theelections. They would certainlybenefit from such a development.The other beneficiaries couldvested interest that wishes tochange our policies. A majority ofthe parties want elections to be heldon time. We should not spreadrumours to benefit our enemies.—Karachi

An exclusive zonein Islamabad

KHALID IDREES

The town planner who designedIslamabad Master Plan divided thearea included in the Plan into dif-ferent zones. There are residentialzones, commercial zones, industrialzones and zones where no residen-tial, commercial or industrial activ-ity is permitted. Over the years theCDA with the connivance of thepolitical administrations, both mili-tary and civilian, that have misgov-erned us have played havoc withIslamabad Master Plan.

But at present I shall not dwellon the implications which viola-tions of the Master Plan havecaused. Right now I want to drawattention to another very specialand exclusive Zone that the hasbeen created in Islamabad for lastseveral years.

It neither has any legality norwas it envisaged in the Master Planof Islamabad. What I have in mindis the informal but an exclusiveZone comprising E 7 and E 8 Sec-tors of Islamabad that has been es-tablished by Pakistan Navy andPakistan Air Force. Citizens notserving in the armed forces of Pa-kistan are not allowed entry in thisZone as a matter of routine. Untilone year ago common citizenswould be allowed entry in this Zonefrom the designated entry pointsafter depositing their CNICs whichthey could retrieve at the time ofexiting the Zone. Since about oneyear this so called “ facility “ hasbeen withdrawn because, accord-ing to the authorities, common citi-zens do not deserve this.

The above-referred so calledZone has been created in the nameof security. Now, preventing com-mon citizens from entering thisZone is tantamount to abridgingtheir right of free movement guar-anteed by the constitution. Furtherthis adds to the alienation betweenthe armed forces and common citi-

Justice delayed is justice deniedSULEMAN MANSHA GANDHI

Chairman NAB, Admiral Fasih Bukhari has suggested ECP to give up useless marathon exercise ofscrutiny of all candidates for it is impossible for the commission to complete the job. He further said

“if action is taken against the candidates they would be barred from contesting the coming electiongiving the impression that their political parties are being victimized.” The suggestions, being discour-aging, cannot be praised. No law of our country directs to take care of the consequences of any right andlegal decision. The scrutiny of all the candidates and to judge their ability under Article 62 and 63 of theConstitution of Pakistan is not a useless marathon exercise. In the last five years the Apex court had towaist its precious time to make Parliament free of dishonest parliamentarians. Had the then ElectionCommission taken action against those candidates whose degrees were fake, who were tax evaders, bankloans and utility dues defaulters, the time of the Apex Court and the image of our Parliament could havesaved. As far as the idea “our political party is being victimized is concerned” will be propagated at thevery time whenever the Election Commission of Pakistan and The Apex Court will try to judge thecandidates according to the Constitution. Election Commission cannot save itself from the allegation ofvictimizing a political party, regardless of the fact that it scrutinizes the candidate before and afterelection. The people who have deceived this nation does not deserve to be in the Parliament again. SoECP should not let them take part in the elections come what may.—Lahore

READERS

Email:editorial@pakobserver.net

are requested to typetheir letters legibly withdouble spacing and only onone side of the paper.

—Editor

zens. I recall the spirit of genuinecamaraderie that existed between thepeople and the armed forces until themid sixties. Unfortunately sinceearly seventies, camaraderie of thesixties began to be replaced by afeeling of alienation. This is not theplace to go into the whys andwherefores of this transformation inthe general public’s perception.However, suffice it to say that mea-sures like creating exclusive areasfor the armed forces where commonpeople are denied access, albeit inthe name of security, alienate peoplefrom the armed forces.

This is particularly so when theoverall security situation of thecountry in far from ideal. Peoplehave now become aware that it istaxpayers’ money that is being spentto provide security to only a specialcategory of persons at the cost ofleaving the majority “ exposed “ tothe dangers. The realization is be-coming strong that this is unjust situ-ation which should not be allowedto continue. It is time that those whowield the decision-making appara-tus do away with the blatantly dis-criminating security dispensationsfor the selected few. Before it is toolate let us institute inclusive secu-rity arrangements and do away withthe exclusive arrangements whichare in vogue at present.—Islamabad

MerewetherTower

YASIR FEROZ

Merewether Tower, or Tower as thebus conductors shout, cannot bemissed by anyone standing on a busstop or going through main roads ofthe Karachi city. It is one of the mostknown, but arguably the least ac-knowledged landmarks of the city.Beautifully carved, elegantly de-signed, adorned with mysterious themotifs tower was raised by publicsubscription as a memorial for SirWilliam L Merewether and De-signed by James Strachan, the Mu-nicipal Engineer. The foundationstone was laid by the Governor ofBombay, Sir James Fergusson in1884.It was formally opened to thepublic in 1892 by the Commissionerof Sindh, Sir Evan James.

The structure is built in camelcolored and shows a heightened sen-sitivity to detailing and emphasis oncarving and decoration. The archi-tecture takes the form of an Eleanorcross. Eleanor crosses were a seriesof 12 monuments erected in Englandby King Edward I between 1291 and1294, in memory of his wife,Eleanor of Castile. Merewethertower stands on a platform which is44 feet square and rises to a heightof 102 feet.

It prominently displays clockson all four sides. The clocks are situ-ated at the base of a spire which is72 feet high from the ground. Theclocks are 7 feet in diameter. In thelast few years, protective iron fenc-ing has been provided all across thetower to keep anti-social elementsaway.

At the time of completion, thetotal cost of the project came out tobe Rs 37,178. Visit this beautiful andmemorable landmark. It may forceauthorities to take better care.—Karachi

KSE’sdelisting rules

MUJEEB UR RAHMAN

In the beginning of this weekKarachi Stock Exchange has recom-mended the 7th largest weightingcompany in KSE to buy back itsshare at Rs 15,000 instead of Rs9,500 per share against its proposalfor delisting itself from the KSE.The offer is also disadvantageous tothe KSE because losing the globalfood and consumer giant will se-verely affect Karachi Stock Ex-change.

KSE being a market regulatorhas a power to accept or reject thedelisting proposal or determine thebuyback price of voluntary delistingof companies. KSE rather than al-lowing this arbitrary and grossly

Syria, Iran & NRA vs everybody

It was always wishful thinking toexpect that all of the United Nations’ 193 member states would

approve the treaty regulating globaltrade in conventional weapons thatwas negotiated in New York thisweek. But the conclusion reached onThursday was stark: On one side,opposing the new pact, were three ofthe world’s pariah states – Syria, Iranand North Korea. On the other side,favouring the new pact, was … ev-erybody else.

The contrast among interestgroups, not voting, but influencingthe process from the wings, wasequally stark. Those advocating forthe treaty included Oxfam, the inter-national humanitarian organization;

the Washington-based Arms ControlAssociation, which promotes non-proliferation; and religious groupssuch as the National Association ofEvangelicals, the National Council ofChurches and the Vatican.

The opposition included the con-servative Heritage Foundation andthe National Gun Rifle Association.As usual they ginned up dark visionsof how any limits on conventionalarms sales would deprive Americansof their weapons, which is totallyfalse: The Obama administration bentover backwards to make sure thetreaty excluded domestic sales and,in any event, as the American Bar As-sociation affirmed, the treaty did notand could not infringe on Americans’constitutionally-guaranteed SecondAmendment Rights.The treaty is es-sential. The world is awash in con-ventional weapons with a market val-

ued at upward of $70 billion a year.These arms are fuelling conflicts andkilling innocents in Syria, Sudan, theDemocratic Republic of Congo andbeyond. But while trade in virtuallyevery major commodity, from oil tobananas, is subject to strong interna-tional agreements, conventionalarms, absurdly, are not. The treatywould require states to review allcross-border arms contracts, establishnational control systems and denyexports to purchasers who might usethe weapons for terrorism or viola-tions of humanitarian law.

India, the world’s number onearms buyer, tried to carve a huge loop-hole by proposing that the pact ex-empt defence cooperation agree-ments. In the end, the language wasmassaged in a way that arms controland human rights groups said wouldsave face for New Delhi while not

Carol Giacomo

stable economies will support,revive and sustain sick econo-mies. The stimulus package hasfailed in US and it will not workthe EU and Cyprus.

The dirty game of lootingtaxpayers’ money in the name of

Europe must stop. The lack of con-sensus on austerity and spending poli-cies at political level has resulted inpolicy vacuum. It has allowed Ger-many to suck hundreds of billionsof tax Euros that were pumped intothe failing economies of Europe in-cluding Greece, Italy and Spain. Theflow of capital shows that they arebeing spent in Germany while thetaxpayers pay for it in failing econo-mies and loan is piling up for theirfuture generations. The moneyshould be spent in their countries torevive their economies, welfare andjob creation. The stronger economiesof Europe should not benefit from thetax money and loan money of weakereconomies in the Union. The use ofweaker states tax money to sustaineconomies of stronger economies ofEurope must end.

The imposition of levy on Cyprusis anti-democratic. The pro-EUvoices are using Cyprus to define theconcept of ‘pooled sovereignty’ ascontrolling political, constitutionaland democratic rights of memberstates. This undermines the spirit ofthe union and the past practice clearlyshow that cooperation in EU is re-stricted to trade and commerce only.Europe that like public, Cyprus par-liament was turned into a spectator,while troika decided the fate of anindependent country. It was violation

Views From Abroad

People the ultimate arbiters

For the political forces who havebeen salivating to see democracy taking roots in the country

and power transferred through ballot,the dream has come true with thenomination of the caretaker PrimeMinister by the ECP as required un-der the constitution, removing anydoubts about people finally exercis-ing their right of franchise withoutany hindrance or intervention fromany quarter. A new tradition wouldhave been set if the Prime Ministerand the opposition leader hadagreed on the name of the caretakerPrime Minister. Nevertheless it isencouraging and satisfying to notethat the process has culminatedwithout any hic-up.

Nonetheless, it is gratifying tonote that the care taker Prime Minis-ter enjoys the confidence of all themajor political players on the chessboard of Pakistani politics. Justice(retd) Mir Hazar Khan Khoso has hadan impeccable and unblemished ca-reer as a judge and enjoys good repu-tation. Another positive factor is thathe belongs to Balochistan, that might

help in placating the Baloch nation-alists and tempt them to join themainstream of the national politics byparticipating in the ensuing elections.

The caretaker Prime Minister,immediately after his nomination toldthe media that his first and foremostpriority would be to support and helpthe ECP to ensure holding of free andfair elections in the country and thathe would treat all the political par-ties alike. That indeed is very reas-suring. The words of a savant likehim can be safely taken at their facevalue. He also made it clear that thePresident did not have any role in theelections; an implied reference to theoften-repeated allegations by a politi-cal party that free and fair electionscould not be held while Zardari wasin the office.

He is right, because the electionsare to be held by the ECP with thesupport of the executive and thePresident does not figure in thescheme of things in this regard. Witha neutral and honest man heading theexecutive, assertive ECP, pro-activejudiciary and the ever vigilant mediait would almost be impossible for anyother entity or individual to influencethe outcome of the elections in anyunconstitutional manner taking ad-vantage of his position. Much will

also depend on the way the politicalparties conduct themselves in regardsto the efforts of the ECP and the care-taker set up in holding elections in atransparent manner. They need tobehave in a responsible manner dur-ing their elections campaigns andfocus more on selling their manifes-toes instead of mud-slinging andlaunching personal attacks on theirrivals because ultimately it is on thebasis of their performance or theprogrammes for the future presentedby them that the people have to maketheir choices.

For the elections to be free andfair it is essential that they are heldin a convivial atmosphere and thetraditional hostility and animositytowards each other gives way to ahealthy and productive competitionamong them. Now that all is set totranslate the dream of transition ofpower by reference to the people andconsolidating the gains of democ-racy, all the stakeholders especiallythe political parties owe it to themasses not to do any thing whichshatters their faith in democracy orprovides any excuse to the forcesinimical to democratic dispensationto make their move and drag thecountry back to the dark alleysagain. The political parties and their

unfair action by the company, theregulators should exercise the dis-cretion given to them by Pakistan’slaws and deny the de-listing.

However a minority shareholderI would like to highlight thatdelisting of such high weightagecompany from the KSE will openfloodgates for all other MultinationalCorporations’ subsidiaries to follow,and minority shareholders will bethrown out in the streets with themessage that they have no voice inPakistan. The MNC is privatise itsPakistani subsidiary at a cheap valu-ation because it feels it can. they sawvalue in the Pakistani subsidiary atcurrent valuations given its longterm growth prospects.

They are taking advantage of thede-listing rules in Pakistan becausethey are more lenient than else-where. Minority interests are clearlydisadvantaged as their objectionscarry no weight. This is differentfrom other markets where morestringent rules apply. For example,in India the threshold for approvalis 90% of all votes.

Furthermore, the privatisationmust be approved by two thirds ofthe minority shareholders at a priceagreed through a process of reversebook building. Undoubtedly a mat-ter of concern for the protection ofminority interests, the credibility anddevelopment of the Stock Exchange,and the development of the capitalmarket in Pakistan if controllingshareholders, particularly multina-tionals, can delist companies so eas-ily. We would urge the KSE to re-sist such initiatives and would en-courage the Exchange to toughen itsdelisting procedures and bring themmore in line with internationalnorms.

If this attempt of MNC to delistin Pakistan is successfully blocked,it will send a powerful message tothe investor community at largeabout the protection of minorityshareholder rights and the presenceof an efficient and fair regulatorybodies in the country. I request theconcerned authorities towards thisneglected issue that will affect theminority shareholders today but willdamage the whole Pakistan’s na-tional finance in future.—Islamabad

Apathy towardspolice safety

AKBAR ALI KHALIQDINA

Repair works have been carried outrecently on Karachi-Thatta Road. Iam shocked to see the bad planninginvolved in the construction of theroad. Once the sun settles, drivingon this road is dangerous and deadly.As soon as one crosses the Karachitoll, there is a police barrier wherestones are placed on the road some10 metres away from the barrier,which are barely visible at night.This was only the beginning of thedeath ride.

The road is constructed such thatit is a combination of two-lane roadand single-lane road. Moving on tothe two-lane road from the single-lane road or vice versa has no indi-cation or sign and is purely on thedriver’s judgment. Many confuseddrivers do not change road and in-crease the likelihood of accidents.One could see, at several places,glass shattered on the road which in-dicates that there have been severalaccidents on the road.

There were barely any police onthe road. It is known that on the roadfrom Thatta to Hyderabad dacoitshave been looting people, and nowperhaps the authorities are waitingfor this activity to begin on this roadalso. The same road is used by manyofficials and ministers, yet no atten-tion is paid to public safety matters.—Karachi

leaders must also desist from state-ments or actions that could make therole of the care taker government orthe ECP controversial. They shouldkeep faith in the impartiality and thecapability of these institutions tomake these elections a significantmilestone in our march towards apolitical polity envisioned by thefounding father.

Another very important factor inthis respect would be the acceptanceof elections results with an open heart,the lack of which has been the baneof democracy in this country. Thenation has suffered the consequencesof this kind of behaviour and wesurely need a break from this dread-ful experience of the past. Merelypaying lip service and making tallclaims about their love for democracyis not enough. Political Parties willhave to show their commitmentthrough their actions. That is the onlyway forward. Any digression fromthis path may produce negative re-sults. The media and intelligentsiaalso have a great responsibility inguiding and helping the people tounderstand what is at stake and re-porting the unfolding events in anobjective and impartial manner toplay their contributory role instrengthening democracy.

overriding the treaty. The negotiat-ing conference required consensusto approve the treaty and then sendit on to member states for signatureand ratification. But the oppositionby Iran, North Korea and Syria,while an unfortunate stumblingbloc, doesn’t mean it is dead.

Proponents can and will take itto the United Nations General As-sembly, possibly next week, wherea less onerous but still binding ma-jority vote is all that’s necessary forapproval. After that, we hope Presi-dent Obama, who was very instru-mental in bringing the treaty to thispoint, will lead the way in quicklysigning it and that the Senate willmove expeditiously to ratify it. It’sinconceivable that any senatorcould justify agreeing with Iran,North Korea and Syria on this is-sue. — The New York Times

of the agreed EU parameters whichdo not allow undermining ofsoverignity votes.

The imposition of levy on Cyprusis anti-democratic. The pro-EUvoices are using Cyprus to define theconcept of ‘pooled sovereignty’ ascontrolling political, constitutionaland democratic rights of memberstates. This undermines the spirit ofthe union and the past practice clearlyshow that cooperation in EU is re-stricted to trade and commerce only.Europe that like public, Cyprus par-liament was turned into a spectator,while troika decided the fate of anindependent country. It was violationof the agreed EU parameters whichdo not allow undermining ofsoverignity votes. Furthermore, theevery member state has the right toveto. The major economic policies aredomain of parliament. The decisionof imposing austerity measures by theEU and levy by president withoutapproval of the parliament is illegal,undemocratic and unconstitutional.The jury on fate of levy policy in Eu-rope is still out. Moscow has con-demned the move as counterproduc-tive. Cyprus deal will only promotecorruption. The math shows thatCyprus government is likely to earnmore on the offshore deposits thanthe EU bailout. The lack of trans-parency about details of the levy andits spending is the real issue. Thereare fears that the earnings will be lostto corruption. The likely collusionbetween authorities and powerfullobbies in the country such as unionswill skim the benefits and leave or-dinary Cypriot taxpayer to face aus-

Gee mama they are pitting meagainst Uncle Modi! “Yesmy son, my pretty son with

that pretty little dimple, whom allthe Indian girls are falling for,what chance has anyone gotagainst you?”

“He has done many things inGujarat ma?” “Yes my son, whileyou were learning to woo your Ar-gentina girlfriend, he was windingburning tires around women, while

you were learning to grow a beard,he was teaching the state how to lookthe other way!”

“Gee mama they are pitting a sea-soned man against me!” “You are aseasoned boy my son. Who else couldhave sat with that pretty girl watch-ing a cricket match? Who else can goin front of an audience and show hispretty dimple, open his mouth, notsay anything, but show his prettydimple?”

“He has changed the economy inhis state ma!” “We also have changedthe state of this country son! We havekept judges working overtime, wehave given enough scandals for TVchannels to run with breaking newsday after day!

We have changed the state of thiscountry my son!” “But ma uncleModi may challenge me to a debate?”“My son, my son with that prettydimple, whom all the Indian girls arefalling for, what chance has anyonegot against you?”

“Should I learn to speak ma?”“No, no my son, when you open yourmouth that pretty dimple cannot beseen.” “Should I learn more about thecountry mama?” “What more is thereto be learnt my son, you are a Gandhi,son of a Gandhi, grandson of aGandhi, and great grandson of aNehru, there is nothing more to learnmy son, just two words, Gandhi,Nehru, Nehru, Gandhi!” “But ma?”“What ease it my son?” “They are

Uncle Modi..!pitting me against Uncle Modi!”“My son!” “Yes mama?” “Youmust do only one thing!” “What isit mama?” “You must never callhim uncle!”

“What should I call himmama?” “Narendra!” “But uncleModi will get very angry mama!”“Yes my son, it will be his anger,his haughtiness, stemming from adeep sense of insecurity that willpull him down.

You are a Gandhi, but you don’tneed to tell the world that, they al-ready know. Do you understand myson?” “Gee mama they are pittingme against Narendra!” “Now youwill win my son..!”—Email: bobsbanter@gmail.com

terity-axe and repay the loans.Banking reforms are must. Thebanks are soaking up all kinds ofmoney in the modern economies.The stimulus packages in EU mem-ber states like Spain, Italy or for thatmatter in US were given to bankson the assumption that they will re-vive the businesses and reach theMain Street. But the reports showthat banks used the stimulus moneyto pay bonuses, overcome theirlosses and correct their inventories.Reportedly, the stimulus packagesgiven to western banks from taxpay-ers’ money have exceeded 2.27 tril-lion dollars. It is now clear that col-lusion between politicians, bank-ers and the technocrats was to save‘too big to fail’ banks from bank-ruptcy not the public. Austerityversus spending is a hoax to coverthe theft. Cyprus is its latest vic-tim. If governments are seriousabout nation building, economyand individual welfare, they haveto restore traditional banking, bringbanks under state control, recoverlooted wealth from bankers, endcasino banking, and adopt indepen-dent economic policies.

Cyprus levy has underminedfoundation of modern state. Theretrospective imposition of levyon bank deposits has destroyed thefaith of individual in modern stateand its institution. It is now theconstitutional, moral and demo-cratic duty of state and its institu-tions to scrap the law to restoretrust of citizens in state. Cyprusrobbery is likely to force publicto review stay in EU.

Rizwan Ghani Email:sadcat44@hotmail.com

Malik M AshrafEmail: ashpak10@gmail.com

LAHORE: Former Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif interviewing ladies for award of special seats tickets forPML-N members.

LAHORE: Devotees performing religious obligations during the Mela Charaghan Madhoo Lal Hussain (RA).

Russia lashesFrom Page 1

Earlier, Russia said anypurportedly political NGOreceiving foreign fundingmust register as a foreignagent.

Nuland on Thursdaysaid Washington was con-tinuing to fund Russian or-ganizations through un-specified “platforms outsideRussia.”

Lukashevich called that“barefaced interference inour internal affairs.”—AP

Pakistan supports India’sstand on UN ATT

From Page 1

elections under the banner ofhis party, the All PakistanMuslim League.

He has filed his nomina-tion papers for the NationalAssembly from three con-stituencies - NA-250(Karachi), NA-32 (Chitral)and NA-48 (Islamabad).According to a private tele-vision channel, the InteriorMinistry on Saturday issueddirectives to the immigrationauthorities to putMusharraf ’s name on theExit Control List (ECL).

Musharraf is now lead-ing his own political party theAll Pakistan Muslim League(APML), and will contest forparliamentary seats in theMay 11 elections.

Felt little insulted, humiliatedstanding before judge

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peared to seek extension ofhis pre-arrest bail in a seriesof cases.

Musharraf, appeared in acourt in Karachi for the firsttime in his life. “This is thefirst time, that I ever entereda courtroom in my life. If I wasto be very frank with you onmy feelings, if you want toknow my feelings, the firstfeeling when I stand up forthe judge when he enteredwhich was the norm, thenorm which I had to follow, Idid feel somehow a little in-sulted, a little humiliated,”Musharraf told CNN.

“But then I started think-ing to myself that I have beensaying that everyone isequal in the eyes of law. So Ithought to myself, well, I havebeen saying this.

The law applies to mealso. So may be, would beupset for other, that youyourself got involved,” said

the former military ruler.When asked if he trusted

the judicial system,Musharraf said one has toface all the consequences. “Iknow, my conviction is thatthere is nothing against me.And there were arrest war-rants that were issued, for mynonappearance in the court,”he said.

“Now when I appearedon the cases in the court,there shouldn’t be a reasonfor my arrest. And we shouldproceed with the cases. Asfar as the cases are con-cerned, they are politicisedand there’s nothing againstme.

From any point of view,there is nothing against me.So therefore, with that con-viction, I’ll face the courts,”he said.

Pervez Musharraf toldCNN he never saw a by-stander hurl a shoe that at him

as he headed into a Karachicourt on Friday to seek a bailextension on charges of cor-ruption. “I didn’t even see it.There was nothing that hitme. Later on, I was told thatsomebody hurled something.But nothing of that sort wasvisible,” he said.

“But later on they told me,those around me, there werehundreds of people who aremy supporters. I think later onI was told that the man wasreally overpowered and hegot a thorough beating orsomething.

But I don’t know whothrew what. I didn’t know atall,” he said.Musharraf saidhe has been living underthreats of death since Septem-ber 11, 2001, when he sup-ported the American war onterror and targeted theTaliban. “I’ve been sufferingfrom this threat all along,” hesaid.—INP

PTI historicrally in

Swat today:Imran

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sus among the 193 membercountries because of oppo-sition from North Korea, Iranand Syria.

India said the treaty ini ts present form wouldcompromise with i ts na-t ional interest mainly i tdoes it favours the arms ex-porting nations and is weakon arms supply to non-State actors. Pakistan,however, remained si lenton the second concernsraised by India.

Proponents of the treatyhave now decided to put itto vote at the UN GeneralAssembly as early as Tues-day.

While the final decisionby India is yet to be taken,New Delhi is most likely toend up abstaining, i f notvoting against the drafttreaty.

The US on Thursday,however, tried to ally In-dian fears by arguing thatit “does not harm” India’snational interest. “My ownview is that this treaty willnot be harmful to India’ssecurity and certainly notin any way harm the verystrong bilateral relat ion-ship between India and theUnited States,” Mr TomCountryman, head of theUS delegation to the ArmsTrade Treaty Conference

17-memberSindh interim

cabinetsworn in

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Those who took oathwere: Shakaib Qureshi,Nawab Kalbe HussainLahori, Muhammad SharifAnsari, Sardar Khan Ghoto,Mahmood Mandviwala,Iqbal Dawood Pakwala, RaisGhulam Qasim Jaskani, DrJunaid Ali Shah, SardarYasin Malik, Syed ShabbarZaidi, Khalid Tawab, Dr NALohani, Ms. Anis Haroon,Khalid Latif, Ms NoorulHuda Shah and Abdul QadirChouhan.

Members of the provin-cial caretaker cabinet will beallocated their portfolios onMonday, Justice (retd)Zahid Kurban Alavi, thecaretaker Chief Minister ofSindh, said after the oath-tak-ing ceremony.

Meanwhile, Mian ZahidHussain and HaroonFarooqui have been ap-pointed as Provincial Advis-ers in the cabinet. A notifica-tion in this regard would beissued later, it was furtherstated.

Aggressive talk from NorthKorea concerns US leaders

From Page 1its military phone line withthe South, which is used tocoordinate logistics along thedemilitarized border buffer.

In a new escalation ofrhetoric early Saturday, NorthKorea’s official KCNA newsagency reported that thecountry was entering a “stateof war” with South Korea andthat “all issues raised be-tween the North and theSouth will be handled accord-ingly.”

Some experts noted that

South Korea also hasadopted a more aggressiverhetorical posture. Senior of-ficials quoted anonymouslyin the media have suggestedthat plans have been drawnup for “surgical strikes”against North Korea.

“The level and scope ofthe rhetoric [in North Korea]is stronger than in the past,”said Scott A. Snyder, a Ko-rea expert at the Council onForeign Relations. “This timewe’ve seen a higher level of

Karzai in QatarFrom Page 1

But, with Nato-led combattroops due to withdraw fromAfghanistan by the end of2014, Karzai agreed to the pro-posed Taliban office in theQatari capital Doha and is ex-pected to firm up the plan withthe emir of Qatar on Sunday.

Any future peace talks stillface numerous hurdles beforethey begin, including confu-sion over who would repre-sent the Taliban and Karzai’sinsistence that his appointees

be at the centre of negotia-tions. “We will discuss thepeace process, of course, andthe opening of an office for theTaliban in Qatar,” presidentialspokesman Aimal Faizi toldAFP before Karzai left Kabul.

“If we want to have talks tobring peace to Afghanistan, themain side must be the Afghangovernment’s representatives– the High Peace Council,which has members from all thecountry’s ethnic and political

backgrounds,” Faizi added.A statement from Karzai’s of-fice said he was accompaniedon the two-day state visit byForeign Minister ZalmaiRassoul and SalahuddinRabbani, chairman of the HighPeace Council.Negotiating withthe Taliban regime that hadharboured al Qaeda before the9/11 attacks was for many yearsanathema to countries fightingin the UN-backed coalitionagainst the militants.

— shuts downwebsite temporarily

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The ECP stated that de-spite second cyber attack allits data is safe and its websitewould be restored after shift-ing it on another server.

Sources said nominationpapers of the candidateswould be uploaded on thewebsite within next few days.

Earlier, Cyber attacks onthe website of the ElectionCommission of Pakistan(ECP) were foiled but thewebsite itself has been shut-down deliberately to avoidfurther attacks.

Director General IT,Khizar Aziz, at the ECP saidthat Asian and Russian hack-ers launched attacks on thewebsite but these attackswere foiled, adding all thedata of the Election Commis-sion, posted on the website,is safe.

“Had our host server wasbased in Pakistan, then therecould have been immenseloss,” he said, adding thatthe ECP host server is basedin Canada, which is now be-ing transferred to more se-cure server.

Khizer Aziz said thatECP’s website has been shutdown under a deliberate strat-egy to avoid further attacksduring the transition period.It may be mentioned that ECPwebsite carries all the crucialdata with regard to upcom-ing general elections inMay.—INP

ECP seeks defaulters list in 48 hoursFrom Page 1

tonomous, private utility or-ganizations had been askedto provide the lists of default-ers.

Meanwhile, the ElectionCommission of Pakistan re-laxed the conditions of open-ing a new bank account forthe prospective electioncandidates to justify theelection expenditureswithin the announced lim-its.

According to a notifica-tion issued by the ECP onSaturday, the authority hasdecided that all the pro-spective candidates whowould file nomination pa-pers on March 31, 2013 can

either provide the numberof their existing account inany bank, if any, or opennew bank account and pro-vide that number to the Re-turning Officers concernedon the day of scrutiny oftheir nomination papers.

The statement addedthat the decision was takenafter a number of prospec-tive candidates called theECP and told them that itwas not possible to opennew bank accounts onMarch 31, 2013 given banksare closed on Sunday.

The candidates arguedthat since an account won’tbe opened in time, they

could not indicate an ac-count number in the rel-evant column.

The offices of ElectionCommission Balochistanwill remain open in holi-days .

In a statement issued onSaturday, the ProvincialElection CommissionerBalochistan SultanBayazeed said that officeswould remain open on holi-days in order to facilitatecandidates to submit theirnomination forms.

The candidates can alsosubmit their nominationforms during weekly offdays, he said.

Pope refers to‘Muslim brothers’on Good Friday

ROME—Pope Francisreached out in friendship to“so many Muslim brothersand sisters” during a GoodFriday procession dedicatedto the suffering of Christiansfrom terrorism, war and reli-gious fanaticism in theMiddle East.

The new pontiff, who hasrankled traditionalists by re-jecting many trappings of hisoffice, mostly stuck to thetraditional script during thenighttime Way of the Crossprocession at Rome’s Colos-seum, one of the most dra-matic rituals of Holy Week.

With torches lighting theway, the faithful carried across to different stations,where meditations andprayers were read out recall-ing the final hours of Jesus’life and his crucifixion.

This year, the prayerswere composed by youngLebanese, and many recalledthe plight of minority Chris-tians in the region, wherewars have forced thousandsto flee their homelands. Themeditations called for an endto “violent fundamentalism,”terrorism and the “wars andviolence which in our daysdevastate various countriesin the Middle East.”

Francis, who becamepope just over two weeksago, chose, however, tostress Christians’ positiverelations with Muslims in theregion in his brief commentsat the end of the ceremony.—A P

told reporters during a con-ference call.

In her intervention dur-ing the closing argumentsat the UN headquarters inNew York, India’s Perma-nent Representat ive toConference on Disarma-ment, Geneva and Head ofthe Indian Delegation tothe Arms Trade TreatyConference, Sujata Mehta,said that the final versionfell short of India’s expec-tat ions and that of otherlike minded countries.

“At the commencementof this Conference Indiahad made clear that theATT should make a realimpact on illicit traffickingin conventional arms andtheir illicit use especially byterrorists and otherunauthorised and unlawfulnon-State actors.

The provisions in thefinal draft on terrorism andnon-state actors are weakand diffused and f ind nomention in the specific pro-hibit ions of the Treaty,”Ms Mehta said in her in-tervention.

India, she said, hasstressed consistently thatthe ATT should ensure abalance of obligations be-tween export ing and im-porting states.

“India cannot accept

that the Treaty be used asan instrument in the handsof exporting states to takeunilateral force majeuremeasures against import-ing states parties withoutconsequences,” she said.“The relevant provisions inthe final draft do not meetour requirements. There isa fundamental imbalance inthe text which is flawed asthe weight of obligations ist i l ted against importingStates.

As an importing statewe will take measures toensure that the treaty doesnot affect the stability andpredictabil i ty of defensecooperation agreementsand contracts entered intoby India,” Ms Mehta ar-gued .

The draft text came upfor approval on Thursdayafter the UN membersfailed to adopt it in July lastyear even after month-longnegotiat ions.

UN Secretary GeneralBan Ki-moon expresseddisappointment on the fail-ure of the United NationsConference on the ArmsTrade Treaty to reach anagreement on the text ,which for the f irst t imewould have regulated theinternational arms trade. —Online

match in the history ofPakistan was going to beplayed and “ I will bring in aneutral empire for this“international cricketmatch”

Khan who often usescricket terminology in hisspeeches, said he had beenstruggling over the last 17years and knew well how tofight.

He said that PTI work-ers would be deputed atevery poll ing stat ion tocheck poll rigging, addingthat the party volunteerswould run door-to-doorcampaign to spread i tsmessage.

Musharraf’sname placed

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Police officer martyred, twoterrorists killed

From Page 1Mardan but they resorted tofiring on the Police party andhurled grenade on the lawenforcers that led to the kill-ing of Additional SHOKhushdil Khan. Besides threecivilians were also woundedseriously. As the terrorists fledfrom the scene the police partchased the trouble makers andgunned down one of themwhile the other detonated theexplosive jacket he was wear-ing to escape arrest.“Two assailants riding a mo-torcycle targeted a group ofpolicemen outside of the po-

lice station in Katlang bazaar.As a result of the grenade at-tack, Additional SHO KhushDil died on the spot, whilethree others were wounded.The attackers tried to flee thescene but were chased by apoliceman and in the retalia-tory fire, the police gunneddown one attacker, while theother one wearing a con-cealed explosives vest, blewhimself to avoid arrest”. ThePolice officials said.

Deputy Inspector General(DIG) Mardan, Jaffar Khanwhile confirming the suicide

attack said the handler of thesuicide bomber was also killedin a police encounter after theblast adding three people in-cluding the SHO, a shop-keeper and a passerby wasinjured in the attack. Police cor-doned off the area and rescueteams rushed to the site of theexplosion and shifted the deadbodies and the injured to hos-pital. The unknown terrorists,a few days back, had gunneddown two police men at a picketin Mardan following which thesecurity was beefed up in thecity.

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—The AnnualMeeting of the APNS Gen-eral Council held here atAPNS House, Karachi haselected the Executive Com-mittee for the year 2013-14which unanimously electedSarmad Ali as President, Dr.Jabbar Khattak as Senior VicePresident, Masood Hamid asSecretary General, ImtinanShahid as Vice President,S.M. Munir Jilani as JointSecretary and WaseemAhmed elected as FinanceSecretary of the Society.

The AGM held under theChairmanship of Sarmad Ali,President for the year 2012-13, unanimously approvedthe report of the ExecutiveCommittee for the precedingyear as well as the AnnualAccounts of the Society.

The General Council at-tended by 147 members fromacross the country, formed anElection Commission headedby Mr. Younus Riaz, Mr.Usman Arab Saati and Mr.Nasir Daad Baloch as mem-bers. The Election Commis-sion conducted the electionof the Executive Committeefor the year 2013-14. Follow-ing were elected un-opposed:

Karachi Daily Seats:Anwar Farooqi (Daily Aghaz

Sarmad elected APNS PresidentKarachi), Dr. Jabbar Khattak(Daily Awami Awaz), ArshadA. Zuberi (Daily BusinessRecorder), Mukhtar Aqil(Daily Jurat), NajamuddinSheikh (Daily Deyanat) andIlyas Shakir (Daily QaumiAkhbar).

Lahore Daily Seats:Sarmad Ali (Daily Jang),Masood Hamid (Daily Dawn),Imtinan Shahid (DailyKhabrain), Rameeza MajidNizami (Daily Nawa-i-Waqt),Umer Mujib Shami (Daily Pa-kistan), Arif Nizami (Daily Pa-kistan Today).

Rawalpindi /Is lamabadDaily Seats: Mehtab Khan(Daily Ausaf) Islamabad,Khushnood Ali Khan (DailySahafat) Islamabad.

Balochistan Daily Seats:Waseem Ahmed (Daily AwamQuetta), Syed Faseih Iqbal(Daily Balochistan TimesQuetta).

Khyber Pakhtoon KhwaDaily Seats: Syed AyazBadshah (Daily MashriqPeshawar), Pir Sufaid ShahHamdard (Daily WahdatPeshawar).

Sindh excluding DailyKarachi: Javed Mehr Shamsi(Daily Kaleem Sukkur),Muhammad Aslam Kazi (DailyKawish Hyderabad).

Punjab (excluding Lahore/Rwp/Ibd.): Mumtaz A. Tahir

(Daily Aftab Multan),Humayon Tariq (Daily Busi-ness Report Faisalabad) andS.M. Munir Jilani (DailyPaigham Faisalabad).

General Seats (Metropoli-tan Dailies): Aijaz-ul-Haq(Daily Express Karachi), FaisalZahid Malik (Daily PakistanObserver Islamabad).

Seats (Regional Dailies):Humayon Gulzar (DailySayadat Bahawalpur), JamilAther (Daily TijaratGujranwala).

Periodicals Seats: AamerMahmood (Monthly KiranDigest Karachi), Mushtaq A.Qureshi (Monthly Naey UfaqKarachi), Sardar Khan Niazi(Monthly Naya RukhKarachi) and Dr. WaqarYousuf Azeemi (MonthlyRoohani Digest Karachi).

News and News Com-ments Periodical (Punjab /KPK): Rahmat Ali Raaz(Weekly Azm Lahore)

News and News Com-ments Periodical (Sindh /Balochistan): Kazi Asad Abid(Fortnightly Ibrat,Hyderabad) While seat forNews & News Comments Pe-riodicals (General), MonthlyCricketer elected by secretballot. The President electnominated Fauzia Shaheen(Monthly Dastak, Karachi) onwoman - publishers seat.

threat, delivered at a higherlevel.”

He added, “There’s roomfor miscalculation right now.”

Earlier this month, thePentagon announced it wassignificantly bolsteringAmerica’s missile defensecapabilities on the WestCoast. Secretary of DefenseChuck Hagel said Thursdaythat the United States has nooption but to takePyongyang’s threats seri-ously.—Agencies

PESHAWAR: Girl athletes moving towards finish line during Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Inter-Region Women AthleticChampionship at Qayyum Sports Complex.

PESHAWAR—Mardan Regiontook edge against other rivalsteam on the opening day ofthe Khyber Pakhtunkhwa In-ter-Region Women AthleticChampionship, which gotunder here at Qayyum SportsComplex under the aegis ofthe Directorate of SportsKhyber Pakhtunkhwa on Sat-urday. Director WomenGames, Directorate of SportsKhyber Pakhtunkhwa MissRashida Ghaznavi was thechief guest on this occasion.Former national basketballplayer Din Muhammad, Assis-tant Director Amir Zahir Shah,international athletic coachJaffar Shah, Miss Shahana(Lakki Marwat), Miss Sitara(Kohat), Miss Gul Nar(Mardan), organizing Secre-tary Miss Raham Bibi andNajma Qazi, officials and play-ers were also present on thisoccasion.

The opening ceremonywas started with recitation of

Holy Quran by prominentNaat Khawn Kinza Waheed(Hazara), followed by theteams of all seven regions in-cluding Dera Ismail Khan,Bannu, Kohat, Mardan,Malakand, Hazara and hostPeahwar March Past.

Addressing the openingceremony Miss RashidaGhaznavi said that DirectorGeneral Khyber PakhtunkhwaSports Board is very keen tohave sports activities for thefemale. She said so far fouractivities including hockey,cricket, volleyball and basket-ball have been organized. Shesaid after the athletic event,events of the table tennis,judo and squash would beorganized in the month ofApril, followed by othergames like Taekwondo, Ka-rate, football, baseball, soft-ball, netball will be organized.She said like last year the di-rectorate would be organized14 different games for the fe-

male. She said the playerswould be provided all avail-able facilities during the event.She also thanked the officialswho are organizing variousevents and cooperation of theprint and electronic media.

At the end, she an-nounced opening of the ath-letic event. On the openingday Mardan Region domi-nated against other fellowteam. Haseena of Mardangrabbed three gold medals ofthe 100m and 200m and shotput. There was a tough fightbetween Laila Akbar ofPeshawar and Gul ofMalakand in the High Jumpas both competed for thegold medal. At the end Gul ofMalakand took the goldmedal after clearing a heightof 4 feet while Laila got silvermedal by clearing the samein the second attempt insteadof first attempt by Gul.Marium took bronzemedal.—APP

Mardan Region take edge in KPInter-Region Women Athletics

MIAMI—Former winnerAndy Murray and third seedDavid Ferrer will meet in thefinal of the Miami Mastersafter both rallied from open-ing set losses to win theirsemi-finals in three sets. Lastyear’s runner-up Murraylost the opening set in atiebreaker before beatingFrenchman Richard Gasquet6-7 (3/7), 6-1, 6-2 while Span-iard Ferrer ended German vet-eran Tommy Haas’s giant-kill-

ing run 4-6, 6-2, 6-3.Murray, the 2009 cham-

pion, dropped his first set ofthe tournament by losing theopening-set tiebreak to

eighth seed Gasquet, butquickly made amends anddominated the final two setsto reach his third Miami fi-nal.

Murray, who is the loneBritish champion in the his-tory of the Miami event, hasbeaten Ferrer in six out of 11career matches, winning fiveof the last seven. Ferrer hasonly beaten Murray once ona non-clay surface and thatwas at the Barclays ATP

World Tour Finals in 2011.The 26-year-old Scot

clinched the win when afrustrated Gasquet ham-mered a return of serve on

his forehand into the bottomof the net on the first of twomatch points. Murray fin-ished with six aces and won75 percent of his first-servepoints in a centre courtmatch that ended just oneminute shy of being twohours long.

Murray started slowly,struggling with his serve attimes as he double faultedfive times in the match, in-cluding three times in the

opening set. Gasquet, whohas won twice already thisyear but was hampered by aright foot problem in thisone, was trying to become

the first Frenchman to cap-ture the Miami title.

Murray later said hewas pleased at his recov-ery after the disappoint-ment of losing the first set.Gasquet received treat-ment from the trainer dur-ing the break between thesecond and third set for aproblem with his r ightankle. Murray smacked asuperb running cross-court forehand winner toreach match point in theeighth game of the final set.That set up a double matchpoint and Murray wastedno time winning it on hisfirst serve.

A determined Ferrertwice rallied from a breakdown in the third set to endthe giant-killing run of 15th-seeded Haas, who stunnedworld No. 1 Novak Djokovicin the fourth round. The firstsemi-final of the day was aclash of veterans looking forearly birthday presents.Haas turns 35 on Wednes-day and Ferrer is approach-ing his 31st birthday onTuesday. Haas had backedup his upset of Djokovicwith a quarter-final win overGilles Simon, and he got offto a fast start against Ferrer.

The Spaniard lookedout of sorts as Haas brokehim at love for a 3-2 lead inthe opening set , and theGerman broke him again fora 5-2 lead. Ferrer managedto cut down on his errorsin the second set, breakingHaas twice to force a de-ciding third set. Ferrer saidhis service game will be thekey against Murray onSunday.—AFP

Murray, Ferrer to fightfor Miami Masters Cup

KARACHI: Players of Karachi Women Football Club and Marta Women Football teams struggling to get hold on theball during the final of All Karachi Women Football tournament 2013 at Aga Khan Gymkhana Garden.

KARACHI—Eleven nationshave so far confirmed totake part in 29th edition ofAsian Snooker Champion-ship being staged here fromApril 27 to May 3, PakistanBilliards and Snooker Fed-eration (PBSF) announcedhere. “We are expectingaround 16-10 nations to fea-ture in the continentalsnooker gala,” PBSF ChiefAlamgir Shaikh said. “Weare going with plans tohost the event in a befittingmanner.”

He said Afghanistan,China, Hong Kong, India,Iran, Kuwait , Mongolia,Philippines, South Korea,Syria and Qatar have so farconfirmed their participa-tion in the event.

He expressed the hopethat Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan,Lebanon, United Arab Emir-ates, Thailand would alsoconfer their participation inthe event shortly. Pakistan

would be hosting the eventfor the fourth time after con-ducting it earlier in 1991, 1998and 2007.

He said eight Pakistancueists wold be featuring

in the Asian event forwhich Asian Confederationof Billiards Sports (ACBS)has already granted per-mission. Newly crownedNational Champion HamzaAkbar, Imran Shehzad,

Reigning World ChampionMuhammad Asif , formerAsian number twoMuhammad Sajjad, formerNational Champion AsjadIqbal are almost certain tosecure a place in the AsianChampionship.

PBSF President said thecriteria of selecting Paki-stan team would be decidedduring the Executive Com-mittee Meeting. He saidthings are on the track forchampionship and they ex-pected to receive the tablesfrom China which will beused in the event.

Snooker got a big boostafter Muhammad Asif of Pa-kistan won IBSF WorldAmateur crown in Sofia(Bulgaria) in December last.However PBSF suffered aset-back when scheduledIndo-Pak Snooker seriesamong two arch-rivals waspostponed due to a blast inKarachi last month.—APP

Eleven countries confirmparticipation in Asian Snooker

WELLINGTON—New Zealandcricketer Jesse Ryder emergedfrom an induced coma Satur-day, but faced “a big battle”ahead as he recovered from avicious assault, his managerAaron Klee said. Ryder re-quired medical assistance tokeep breathing when he wasrushed to hospital in a criticalcondition early Thursday morn-ing.

He suffered serious headand lung injuries after beingattacked as he left a bar inthe South Island city ofChristchurch. Two men havebeen charged with assaultand police said they were notlooking for anyone else, al-though witnesses said up tofour people were involved inwhat they believed was anunprovoked attack. “Jesse’scondition has improved tothe extent that he is now outof the induced coma and offthe ventilator. Jesse is awakeand talking to us,” Klee said.

“Naturally we are thrilledwith this progress. This isonly the start of the recoveryprocess for Jesse and there is

still a big battle ahead to fullhealth, but the progress ispositive.” Witnesses saidRyder was left “shaking, vom-

iting and covered in blood”after he was repeatedlypunched and kicked. Klee saidRyder had no recollection of

the attack.“He remembers getting a

duck ... not much after that,” hesaid, referring to Ryder’s dis-

missal during his Wellingtonside’s season-ending loss ear-lier in the day to Canterbury ina limited overs match.—AFP

Ryder out of coma, nomemory of attack

ISLAMABAD—An eleven-member team of world’s topskiers arrived here on Sat-urday to chip in a week-longHeliski event “PakistanPure Discovery” that kicksof in Skardu. The event isbeing organized by InterServices Public Relations(ISPR) in collaboration withWalkabout Films, the onlyfilm production company ofthe country focused on ex-treme sports events, wildlifeand natural heritage.

It is a unique event as theinternational heli-skiers fromacross the globe will be skiingin the Karakoram mountain

range in Pakistan, an area whereno one has ever skied before.

Briefing the media at thetime of skiers arrival atBenazir Bhutto InternationalAirport Islamabad, DirectorGeneral ISPR Major GeneralAsim Saleem Bajwa said thatthe purpose of the event wasto showcase the spectacularbeauty, challenging peaksand potential of extremesports in Northern Areas ofthe country. “Spinoff for theevent is to restore mountaintourism for international tour-ists in Pakistan and also bringpeace and stability,” he said.

He said “Pakistan Pure

Discovery” was a set ofheliski events and very highend documentaries thatwould hold the best that Pa-kistan has to offer. He saidPakistan Army had taken theinitiative to promote trekkingand mountaineering and ski-ing in the country. “Theseskiers belong to six differentcountries including France,Canada, Russia, Serbia, Ire-land and Switzerland andmost of them have volun-teered themselves to comePakistan and feature in theevent,” he added. Bajwa saidthat the skiing event wouldbe organized every year on

regular basis. He also invitedcountry’s youth to comeforward and participate inhealthy activities of moun-taineering and trekking.

All members of theHeliski team are certified andqualified professionals.Their team leader is BriceLequetier of France. In anotherwise all male team, theonly woman is SamyraRashid of Pakistan. She innot only among the first ski-ers to ever ski this territory,but will be the first womanto do so. She will also be theonly Pakistani skiing withthe team.—APP

World’s top skiers arrive to skiin Karakoram mountain range

Okara, AahiyanaBoys win matchesin Veteran Cricket

MUZAFFAR ALI

LAHORE—15thNational Se-nior Veteran Cricket Cup matchbetween Golden Eagles andOkara Veterans played at AliGarh Cricket Ground ModelTown was won by Okara nyeight Wickets. Golden Eaglesbatting first scored 293/5 af-ter 30 overs.

Jamshaid Ali was the top-scorer with 113 runs not out,Bakhtiyar Hussain 66, AsifMehmood 42, Ameer Ali 34 &Muhammad Salman Khan 11runs were the other main scor-ers. For Okara Veteran HafizKhalid with 2/50, MalikArshad 1/14, Adnan Amjad 1/27 & Shahid Ehsan 1/52, inreply Okara Veteran made 294/2 after 28 overs. Sheikh Saleembatting well made 102, AsifMehmood 48 & MuhammadHafeez with 125 with not outwas the principal score.Golden Eagles TajamalHussain with 2/54 was themain bowler was the scorer.

Pakistan confidentof Davis Cup winover New Zealand

KARACHI—Pakistan’s DavisCup coach Mohammad KhalidSaturday said he was confidenthis team would win againstNew Zealand in their OceaniaGroup II match in Myanmar nextweek. Pakistan have beenforced to play their home tiesat neutral venues since 2010,due to security fears in thecountry after gunmen attackedthe Sri Lankan cricket team busin March 2009.

That terrorist attack led tothe suspension of all interna-tional sporting activities in Pa-kistan as teams refused to tourthe country. Pakistan re-quested the International Ten-nis Federation stage its tie inMyanmar, where Khalid feelsgrass courts will favour his play-ers. “Grass courts suit our play-ers and I am confident that ourteam will win the tie,” Khalidtold AFP from Lahore, fromwhere the team will depart onSunday. The tie will be playedfrom April 5-7 and a win wouldgive Pakistan the chance to playthe group semi-final in Septagainst the winners of the othersecond-round tie between Thai-land and the Philippines.—AFP

Sri Lanka Cricketpowerless to stopplayers even aspressure mounts

COLOMBO—Reacting tomounting pressure on theauthorities to prevent the SriLankan cricketers from tak-ing part in the upcoming In-dian Premier League, SriLanka Cricket (SLC) Satur-day said it was powerless tostop the players. “We can’tforce players not to go,”Nishantha Ranatunga, theSLC secretary said. Bud-dhist nationalist groupsthroughout last week peti-tioned SLC to stop the crick-eters from going to India toplay in the IPL, after the gov-ernment clarified that theplayers were free to go aslong as they would not beplaying in Tamil Nadu.Ravana Force, one of thegroups who pressurised theSLC for a player boycott,said they would resort tosterner action if the playersgo to India.—INP

WASHINGTON—As Brit-ain prepares to shiver forat least another month, aleading scientist has pre-dicted that the world washeading for another IceAge. Incredibly, BritishSummer Time officiallystarts Saturday but mil-lions of brassed off Britspining for warmth will haveto endure freezing tem-peratures and biting windsuntil May.The misery will continuewith daytime temperaturesstruggling to reach a brac-ing 5C (41F).

The only ray of sun-

shine, forecasters said, isthat it will stay dry. As if theoutlook wasn’t bleakenough already, meteorolo-gists believe the shiveringstart to 2013 has been thecoldest in more than 200years.

More worryingly, thecombination of sub-zerotemperatures and heavysnow experienced acrossmuch of the country recentlycould be the prelude to anew Ice Age that will beginnext year and last for 200years, the Daily Express re-ported.

Russian scientist Dr

Habibullo Abdussamatov,of the St PetersburgPulkovo Astronomical Ob-servatory, painted theDoomsday scenario sayingthe recent inclement weathersimply proved we wereheading towards a frozenplanet. Dr Abdussamatovbelieves Earth was on an“unavoidable advance to-wards a deep temperaturedrop”. The last big freeze,known as the Little Ice Age,was between 1650 and 1850.“The last global decrease oftemperature (the most coldphase of the Little Ice Age)was observed in Europe,

North America andGreenland,” he said.

“All channels in theNetherlands were frozen,glaciers were on the ad-vance in Greenland andpeople were forced to leavetheir settlements, inhabitedfor several centuries.

“The Thames River inLondon and Seine in Pariswere frozen over every year.Humanity has always beenprospering during the warmperiods and suffering dur-ing the cold ones. The cli-mate has never been andwill never be stable,” headded. The miserable

Earth could be heading for another Ice Age

JUI-F Islam ZindaBad moot todayLAHORE—JUI- F will hold“Islam Zinda Bad Confer-ence” at Minar-e-Pakistantoday to demonstrate its po-litical strength. The prepara-tions in this regard have en-tered final phase. A motor-cycle rally led by JUI-F cen-tral spokesman MaulanaAmjid Khan was held fromAbbott road to Minar-e-Paki-stan in connection with con-ference. Party workers par-ticipated in the rally in largenumber.—Online

Militants arrestedRAWALPINDI—Intelligenceofficials Saturday arrestedtwo suspected militants in araid at house in Adiala Road,who were planning an attackon former President PervezMusharraf. Intelligencesources said besides detain-ing two suspects, six rocketlaunchers, six kg explosivematerial and 18 detonatorswere also recovered from theterrorists. Both the suspects,identified as Siddique Khayaliand Shakir, are activists ofGhazi Force. They have beenshifted to some unknown lo-cation for interrogation. —INP

20 suspects held inKachlak operationQUETTA—At least 20 sus-pects were arrested during ajoint operation conducted bypolice, ATF and Balochistanconstabulary in Kachlak areaon Saturday. The arrestedsuspects include Afrad NiazMuhammad, Abul Sana,Muhammad Ismail, NawabKhan, Abdul Ahad, Hassanullah, Gul Behram, HajiMuhammad Hanif, Muhammad Khan, Muh ammadUsman, Haji Muha mmad,Shuja Kh an.—Online

Fake degree holderex-MPA jailedPESHAWAR—Former memberof Khyber Pakhtunkhwa As-sembly Sardar Ali Khan wassentenced to three years inprison in a fake degree caseon Saturday. Sardar Ali Khanwas facing charges of pos-sessing a fake BA degree.Additional Sessions Judgejailed Sardar Ali Khan forthree years and slapped afine of Rs5000.—INP

Senate session inmid-AprilISLAMABAD—Senate sessionis likely to be summoned inthe middle of April. Sourcestold Online that the agendaof the session will includequestions with regard to cer-tain ministries, discussion onpoint of order and Call-atten-tion notices. Sources were ofthe view that the 92nd ses-sion of the Senate will not belegislating as the NationalAssembly has already beendissolved.—Online

Police nab drugdealerVEHARI—The Police havenabbed a notorious drug-peddler and recovered a hugequantity of Opium (Heroin)from his possession here onSaturday. According to policesources, On the direction ofDPO Shakir Hussain Dawar,a police party raided and ar-rested accused, Saleem fromKhanewal Chowk and recov-ered 4 kilogram heroin worthRs 4 million from his posses-sion. —APP

ISLAMABAD: Chief Justice of Pakistan Mr Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry chairing meeting of JudicialCommission in Supreme Court.

weather since the turn ofthe year has been blamedon two episodes of highpressure. Apoorly positioned jetstream means ice cold tem-peratures and the continu-ing risk of snow showersacross the north and east.Almost all of the UK canexpect a continuation ofnight frost, which will turnsevere at times.

April is forecast to be adrier than average month inthe north and east, slightlywetter to the south and westbut it is expected to be one ofthe oldest on record.—INP

ISLAMABAD—The bannedBaloch Liberation Army isout to sabotage the forth-coming general elections andin this regard it has acceler-ated the practice of sendingthreatening letters to the resi-dences of polls candidatesand offices of the politicalparties.

Besides that, reportsemerging from Balochistanrevealed that the candidatesand voters are also receiv-ing threats of being target-killed.

Despite assurances fromthe Chief Election Commis-sioner (CEC) Justice (R)

Fakhruddin G Ebrahim, thepolitical parties inBalochistan have demandeddeployment of securityforces one month prior tothe election day.

The eight Baloch major-ity districts in Balochistanhave been declared ex-tremely sensitive for theforthcoming general elec-tions. However, activitiesof the banned outfits arealso continuing in otherparts of Balochistan.

Areas from Mastung toGawadar including Khuzdar,Awaran, Kalat, Turbat,Chagai and Kharan are

among the areas which havebeen declared most sensitive.

National Party leader MirHasil Khan Bazinjo has con-firmed that the BLA has notonly sent threatening lettersto the residences of the con-testing candidates, but alsosent threatening pamphletsto mosques.

They have threatened totarget the candidates andvoters taking part in the elec-tions.

He has demanded of theCEC to deploy securityforces one month earlier tothe election day inBalochistan.—INP

Balochistan candidates, votersreceiving threats from BLA

SALIM AHMED

LAHORE—Pakistan MuslimLeague- senior leader and ex-Punjab Chief MinisterMuhammad Shahbaz Sharifhas claimed that electricityload shedding problem canbe tackled within two yearsby following the model ofcommitment shown duringthe construction of metrobus project.

While addressing a gath-ering of businessmen at a lo-cal hotel, Shahbaz said thatmetro bus project was com-pleted in record 11 monthsperiod at a cost of 30 billionrupees through strong com-mitment, hard work, devotionand strong will. The PML-N,if voted to power will intro-duce comprehensiveprogrammes for poverty al-leviation, creation of job op-portunities and promotion ofeconomic, industrial andtrade activities in the coun-try.

Among others leadingindustrialists S.M. Munir,Anjum Nisar, Zahid Aslam,Qaiser Ahmad Sheikh andHaji Inam Elahi Asar alsospoke on the occasion.

Shahbaz Sharif main-tained that the PPP-led gov-

Power load shedding can betackled in 2 years: Shahbaz

ernment caused great harm tothe country’s economythrough massive corruptionand bad governance. He saidthe country’s exports are de-clining while IMF is not readyfor giving any programme.However, he said the PML-N is determined to face all thechallenges to revive the na-tional economy. “If voted topower, the PML-N wouldchange the country by fol-lowing reforms agenda imple-mented in Punjab,” he said.

Shahbaz said that Punjabgovernment presented itsthree mega projects worth 36billion of rupees includingmetro bus project, lap topand solar lamp projects toTransparency InternationalPakistan for judging theirtransparency which whenasked “Khan Sahib,” thethen Deputy PM Ch. PervaizElahi and the then Informa-tion Minister Qamar ZamanKaira for proof of their alle-gations, made them speech-less because they failed torespond.

The PML-N leader saidthey served the masses, dur-ing the last five years, withcomplete sincerity, dedica-tion and honesty, over whichhis heart and soul is satis-

fied. He said Pakistan Mus-lim League-N has presenteda revolutionary manifesto forgeneral elections, and wewould field such candidateswho are imbued with thespirit of national service andthey will achieve successduring the elections.

He said the PML-N wouldestablish new records of na-tional service, after againcoming into power, andtransform Pakistan into acountry as envisioned byQuaid-e-Azam and AllamaIqbal, under the dynamicleadership of MuhammadNawaz Sharif.

Shahbaz said that devel-opment projects in Punjabare spread all over the prov-ince, as roads, flyovers, newuniversities, medical col-leges, hospitals and freemedicines were provided tothe across the province.

He said Daanish schoolsare proving quality educa-tion to have-nots while schol-arships are being extended todeserving students throughEducation Endowment Fund.

He said our political op-ponents who claim that de-velopment projects were car-ried out in Lahore during lastfive years live in fools’ paradise.

Meera to contestelection against

Imran KhanMUZAFFAR ALI

LAHORE—Film star Meerahas announced to contestelections against PakistanTehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) chair-man Imran Khan, MuttahidaQaumi Movement (MQM)’sSarfaraz Nawaz and Jamat-e-Islami (JI) Secretary GeneralLiaqat Baloch in the upcom-ing elections.

The actress filed nomina-tion papers for the NationalAssembly’s seat NA-126.She will be contesting elec-tions from the platform ofJustice Party.

Chairman of the JusticeParty said that she is beinggiven ticket of the party forcontesting polls from NA 126.

Record set ofseating 24 in

Alto carGUL HAMAAD FAROOQI

CHITRAL—A local driverbroke word record by setting24 passengers in his small AltoCar. Talking to this scribe thedriver Rahmat Wali Azad saidthat last year he set 34 peoplein his Alto car and demon-strated at Chitral town but hewas not appreciated by anygovernment or non govern-mental organization.

He said that he is an ex-pert driver and can demon-strate on national as well asinternational level by settingmore than 30 people in asmall Alto car.

Eye witnessidentifies murderers

of ShahzebSTAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—Shahzeb MurderCase being heard on dailybasis at the Anti-TerroristCourt in the city took a deci-sive turn after an eye wit-ness, Shah Muhammad con-firmed to the court that thevictim Shahzeb was mur-dered by the arrested ShahRukh Jatoi, Siraj Talpur, SajjadTalpur and Ghulam Murtaza.

The eye witness wasasked to identify the murder-ers of Shahzeb Jatoi in thecourt room, which the eyewitness complied with andtold the court that the ar-rested were those that com-mitted that heinous crimesand had killed Shahzeb Jatoiby piercing his body withbullets from the guns theyhad held in their hands at thetime of the incident.

KABUL—U.S. special opera-tions forces handed overtheir base in a strategic dis-trict of eastern Afghanistanto local Afghan specialforces on Saturday, seniorU.S. commanders said.

The withdrawal satisfiesa demand by Afghan Presi-dent Hamid Karzai that U.S.forces leave the area after al-legations that the Americans’Afghan counterparts com-mitted human rights abusesthere on U.S. orders.

The transfer of authorityends a particularly rocky epi-sode in the strained relationsbetween the U.S. and Karzai.He had insisted that U.S.forces leave Nirkh district inWardak province over thealleged torture, kidnappingand summary execution ofmilitant suspects there —charges U.S. officials firmlydenied.

The incident shows the

US commandos hand overtroubled area to Afghans

larger struggle of Karzai’sgovernment to assert its au-thority over security matters,even as its green securityforces try to assume controlof much of the country fromcoalition forces on a rushedtimeline, ahead of the sched-uled withdrawal of most ofcoalition forces by Decem-ber 2014.

“As we pledged, ourforces have transitionedNirkh district to Afghan na-tional security forces andthey have now assumed fullresponsibility for security inthis key district,” Gen. Jo-seph Dunford, the top com-mander of U.S. and NATOforces in Afghanistan, saidin a statement released Sat-urday.“The rest of Wardak will con-tinue to transition over timeas Afghan forces continueto grow in capability and ca-pacity,” he added.—AP

OIC holds aContact Group

meeting onRohingyas

HAMEED SHAHEEN

ISLAMABAD—The OIC (Or-ganization of Islamic Coop-eration) has activated its ad-ministrative apparatus toprovide relief to Myanmar-uprooted Muslims.The OICSecretary General,Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, an-nounced on Saturday inJeddah that his organizationis planning to hold a meetingat the level of Foreign Minis-ters on 14 April 2013 to dis-cuss the issue of violenceagainst Muslims inMyanmar, says press releaseemailed to Pakistan Observerhere Saturday afternoon..

In his speech at the Con-tact Group meeting onRohingya held at the OICheadquarters in Jeddah onSaturday, Ihsanoglu an-nounced two messages, thefirst was directed to Muslimsin Myanmar stressing thatthe OIC will stand in supportof their cause, and that theOrganization and its MemberStates are following up theissue and are ready to takeall necessary measures andactions to deal with it. In hissecond message, Ihsanogluaddressed the government ofMyanmar and stressed thatit should put an end to theBuddhist extremists and hatecampaigns, as well as ethniccleansing that they hadlaunched against Muslims inthe country, pointing out thatthe OIC will take up this is-sue to international forums tofind a full solution to it.

He warned against thespread of violence, which hadbegan in Arakan State, west ofthe country, and spread toother regions and cities.

The Secretary Generalpointed out that the meetingshould seek to gain the confi-dence of the Rohingya people.

IRFAN ALIGI

KARACHI—Sardar Rahim hadquit Pakistan Muslim Leagueand joined Pakistan MuslimLeague Functional. He hadalso filed his nomination pa-pers for contesting the upcom-ing general elections from twoseats of the province includ-ing PS-113 and PS-114.

While talking to PakistanObserver, Rahim said that hehad called on Pir Sahab PagaraSaturday morning and with hisblessing joined the PMLF andfiled his nomination papers forcontesting the elections fromtwo constituencies of the

Sardar Rahim quitsPML-N, joins PML-F

province. In reply to a ques-tion, he said that he had not toinform the Pakistan MuslimLeague Nawaz Chief or anyother high-up of the said partyabout his decision. The deci-sion of Rahim for parting wayswith the PMLN and joininghands with the PMLF wouldbe quite meaningful becausethe two parties were already inclose alliance for the elections.Rahim had been abroad forpast many years due to differ-ences with the leadership ofthe PMLN. Earlier, HafeezUddin had already quit thePMLN and joined the PakistanTehreek-e Insaf.

ISLAMABAD—Election Com-mission of Pakistan (ECP) onSaturday directed all Re-turning Officers to dis-qualify candidates display-ing lethal weapons andcarry out aerial firing whilesubmitting the nominationpapers.

“It has been noticedthat while filing nominationpapers, the supporters ofcandidates display lethalweapons and carry outaerial firing that is clear vio-lation of the code of con-duct issued by the ElectionCommission” said an ECPofficial talking to APP.

He said according to theCode of Conduct issued by

the ECP, “There will be acomplete ban on carryingand displaying of all kindsof weapons and fire arms inpublic meetings and pro-cessions, as well as on thepolling day and till 24 hoursafter the consolidation ofofficial results by the Re-turning Officer,” the officialobserved.

He said aerial firing,use of crackers and otherexplosives at public meet-ings or near the polling sta-tions are also banned.

The official said all theDistrict Returning Officerand Returning Officer havebeen asked to ensure com-pliance with the Code ofConduct.—APP

Candidates displayingweapons to be

disqualified: ECPKARACHI—Dr FauziaSiddiqui, the sister of Dr AafiaSiddiqui, on Saturday filed nomi-nation papers on NA-250Karachi to contest polls againstthe former President, Gen (Retd)Pervez Musharraf.

Talking to media on the occa-sion, Dr Fauzia said by challeng-ing dictator Musharraf she is re-viving the tradition of mother ofthe nation Fatima Jinnah. She saidFatima Jinnah had boldly contestedpolls against Gen Ayub. She said Iam also the daughter of nation andby challenging Musharraf I ambring back to life the pro-democ-racy tradition of the Madar-e-Millat. She predicted that defeatwould be the fate of Musharraf.

Dr Fauzia said the whole na-

tion knows Musharraf as a sym-bol of oppression, coercion, ex-ploitation, cruelty and enmity todemocracy and justice. She saidat this crucial time of general elec-tions the real face of Musharraf isfully unveiled before the people.She said let us see the response ofthe democratic forces.

She said the so-called war onterror has given Pakistan bitterfruits of human trafficking, miss-ing persons, terrorism, price hikeand joblessness. It has robbedour respect and national honor.She said dictator Musharraf alsobelittled our security forces andwith the defeat of Musharraf theirmorale would be enhanced. Shesaid this is why she decided tochallenge the dictator.—Online

Fauzia to contest electionagainst Musharraf

RAWALPINDI—Anti-terror-ism court conducting thetrial of seven men chargedwith involvement in the 26/11 Mumbai attacks on Sat-urday issued summons tosix witnesses for selling aboat and other equipment tothe accused.

Judge Chaudhry Habib-ur-Rehman, who is conduct-ing the trial behind closeddoors at Adiala Jail inRawalpindi for security rea-sons, issued the summonsto Hamza Bin Tariq,Muhammad Ali,Mohammad Saifullah, UmerDraz, Saqib Iqbal and AtiqAhmed, prosecutors said.

“The accused hadbought the boat, an engineand related equipment fromthese private witnesses,”chief prosecutor ChaudhryZulifqar Ali told PTI afterthe hearing.

He said since Indian au-thorities had not yet re-sponded to Pakistan’s re-

26/11: Summons issuedto 6 for selling boat

quest to allow a Pakistanijudicial commission tocross-examine and recordthe statements of four wit-nesses in Mumbai, the pros-ecution on Saturday re-quested the judge to pro-ceed with the trial.

“There has alreadybeen a considerable delayin the case and the courtshould continue the trialproceedings,” Ali told thejudge during proceedings.

Prosecutors also re-quested the court to take uptheir application to conducthearings every day.

The judge subse-quently adjourned the casetill April 6.

The Pakistani judicialcommission’s visit to Indiahas already been delayedby several weeks over theissue of Islamabad seekingan assurance that membersof the panel will be allowedto cross-examine wit-nesses.—Online

Karachi schooltargeted,

principal killedKARACHI—A principal of aschool in Baldia IttehadTown of Karachi was killedand five children injured in ahand grenade attack on Sat-urday morning.

It was result day in theschool and a large number ofchildren were present whentwo men on a motorcyclecame and hurled a hand gre-nade at the building.

The men barged into theschool and hurled anotherhand grenade.

They also opened fire in-side the school.

The principal, AbdurRasheed, was injured andwas being shifted to a hospi-tal when he succumbed to hisinjuries. He was a leader ofAwami National Party (ANP)and was reportedly receivingthreats over not paying ex-tortion.

The injured children wereshifted to the Civil hospital.

The law enforcement of-ficials arrived at the site andvacated the school.

PML-N not totake Laghari

brothers in partyLAHORE—Pakistan MuslimLeague has decided not toaccept Laghari brothers in itsparty, media reported on Sat-urday.

Media report quotingparty sources said that se-nior leader of PML-N ZulfiqarKhosa called on party Presi-dent Mian Nawaz Sharif hereon Saturday and showed hisconcerns over joining offormer President FarooqLaghari sons, Awais Laghariand Jamal Laghari to theparty.—Online

AN expectant father’s psychological distress may be linked to his toddler’s emotional and behavioral development. The

finding came from new research published inthe journal Pediatrics which analyzed over31,000 Norwegian kids and their parents.

Several previous studieshave shown that the mentalhealth of a mother, duringand after her pregnancy, mayhave an effect on the healthof the child. One studyshowed that children’s earlyexperiences with a mothersuffering from a severe men-tal illness can influence theirlong-term health and devel-opment. Anne LiseKvalevaag, leading re-searcher and a doctoral can-didate in psychology at theUniversity of Bergen in Nor-way, said:

“The results of this studypoint to the fact that thefather’s mental health repre-sents a risk factor for childdevelopment, whereas thetraditional view has been that this risk in largeis represented by the mother. The father’s men-tal health should therefore be addressed bothin research and clinical practice.”

The team of experts interrogated the dadswhen the moms were 4 to 5 months pregnant.They were asked about their mental health, forinstance, whether they felt depressed or afraid.

The mental health of the moms was pro-vided by the mothers themselves, as well asthe behavioral, social, and emotional develop-ment of their children when they were 3 yearsold. Rather than looking at particular diagnosesin kids, the scientists collected information on

whether they had experienced frequent moodshifts, got into fights, or had feelings of anxi-ety, explained Kvalevaag.

High levels of psychological distress werereported by 3% of the dads. The team discov-ered a link between the mental health of the

father and the development ofa child.

The children who hadthe most emotional issues atage 3 were the ones whosedads were the most distressed.The researchers pointed outthat this study did not demon-strate a direct cause-and-effectassociation.

The authors explainedthat there are various possiblemeans that may account forthe relationship. For example,Kvalevaag explained, the fa-thers may be passing on a ge-netic risk to the child. Themental health of the soon-to-be mom could also be influ-enced by the dad’s depression,therefore, causing an effect onthe unborn baby, suggested

another scientist.“If a father is highly distressed, that

could affect the mom’s secretion of hor-mones during pregnancy, it could affect hersleep, her own mental status,” said DanielArmstrong, professor of pediatrics and di-rector of the Mailman Center for Child De-velopment at the University of Miami MillerSchool of Medicine.

“The prenatal mental state of the fatheris likely to predict the postnatal mental healthof the father and this may also account forsome of the associations found,” Kvalevaagrevealed.

Father’s mental healthlinked to child’s behaviour

ISLAMABAD: Musical performance during art & music competition organized by SEED at a local hotel.—PO photo Sultan Bashir

ISLAMABAD: A villager taking nap at bank of Korang River while his animals are grazing.

Negligence in pollenallergy vaccination

may be fatalISLAMABAD—Process of ad-ministering pollen allergy vac-cine to the patients is very tech-nical and any negligence can befatal.

Dr Athar Naz, the respira-tory and allergy specialist atShifa International Hospital andoffice bearer of American De-velopment Board of Allergy,said the most effective solutionof the pollen allergy is keepingaway from the goods and placescausing the allergy.

It is pertinent to mentionhere that the problem of pollenallergy has aggravated inIslamabad, as the Capital De-velopment Authority (CDA)failed to erase paper mulberrytrees from the federal capitalthat is the major cause of theallergy.—INP

SheikhRasheed laudsthe role of ECPISLAMABAD—Former Informa-tion Minister Sheikh RashidAhmed has lauded the role ofElection Commission of Pakistanand said ECP should also re-shuffle Rawalpindi administra-tion to improve the situation.

Talking to Radio Pakistan,he said people should carefullycast their votes, come out on thepolling day and should not let anybody poll fake vote to ensuretransparency.

He said that he is jointlyelectioneering with Imran Khanin NA 56 and NA 55.

He expressed the hope thatpeople of Rawalpindi will takean appropriate decision keepingin view his past services in theconstituency. He said that AliAhmed Kurd is respectable forhim and he has right to contestelection in NA 55. —APP

CITY REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—The MargazarZoo in the federal capital, sup-posed to be model for other cit-ies across the country, gives amiserable look with cages of li-ons, leopards and snakes lyingvacant for last several years.

However, the blithe atti-tude on part of the city admin-istration is more worrisomewho could not manage to bringthe missing animals to the zoo,neither by purchase nor ex-change deals that are commonwith wildlife associationsacross the world.

According to a CDA offi-cial, there had been no lionssince last one decade when theanimal died there owing to pro-longed illness, though in 2001,the zoo had a pair of lions andsix cheetahs.

The pair of lions died andthe CDA donated the cheetahs

on pretext of lacking facilitiesto house of the animals. Ac-cording to the official, fourwere handed over to Loi Bher,Jungle Park Zoo and rest twoto Jungle Wood Park of theArmy.

What to talk of purchasingthe lion, the CDA could noteven construct the facility tokeep the lion at zoo, as in thepast, the CDA had to stop thepurchasing process of the ani-mal due to the same reasons.

As another blow, the fe-male elephant ‘Saheli’ alsodied in the recent past myste-riously, though the exact causesof her death are yet to be as-certained as post-mortem re-port was not yet final.

An official said the projectof new Margazar Zoo is inprogress that would encompassall facilities and animals,which are now missing in thezoo. He said under the project,

the CDA has planned to bringthree lions and a pair of leop-ards.

He said besides the projectcomprises fencing of existingenclosures for animals, devel-opment of sit-out areas, re-placement of sheets at sheds,establishment of hatchery andincubators. Moreover, a secu-rity system would be installedat the zoo includingwalkthrough gates, securitycameras.

He said a month ago, theCDA had floated tenders toimport lions, elephant, giraffeand cheetahs, he added.

The ongoing zoo expansionproject comprises all features tomake the zoo a state-of-the-artthough financial crunch im-pedes the project, the CDA istrying its utmost to improve thefacilities for animals at the zoobesides making up all deficien-cies in it, he added.

Marghazar Zoo yetdeprived of lions, leopards

CITY REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Aabpara andMelody markets are facing prob-lems due to rising encroach-ments, poor sewerage system,and lack of parking facilities.

The two markets are the old-est and busiest business centres inthe city, but they are turning intougly places with immense diffi-culties for shoppers and traders.

The encroached pavementshave made it hard for visitors towalk through the corridors ofthese markets while danglingwires threaten life and propertyof traders and shoppers. The civicauthorities have turned a blindeye to the plight of these marketssituated in the heart of the capi-tal. Talking to APP, a number ofvisitors criticized the authorities

for not taking any action againstthe shopkeepers who have en-croached upon the corridors andfootpaths.

Naveed Abbasi, a visitor,said it had become a nuisance toshop at Melody and Aabparamarkets. “I live in G-6 and it isconvenient for me to shop inthese markets but their conditionis worsening, making it hard forme to continue shopping here.”

He said the shopkeepers andvendors had not only encroachedupon the pavements but also thecorridors in front of the shops,making it hard for people to movearound and shop comfortably.“Shopkeepers allow encroachersto occupy space in front of theirshops, as they get money in re-turn,” he added. Mian Sarfraz,another shopper, complained

about bad sanitary conditions ofthe markets where sewage keepson gushing out of drains andstaining clothes of the visitors.

“Every time I visit the mar-ket, I have to face a similar situ-ation where pounds of stinkywater obstruct the movement ofvisitors,” he said.

Car parking is another ma-jor problem being confronted byvisitors, who have to wait forlonger periods to get a space topark their vehicles. “It takes a lotof time to roam around and finda place for parking,” said a mo-torist Saleem.

Citizens have asked theCapital Development Authority(CDA) to remove encroach-ments, and built a new car park-ing areas around Aabpara andMelody markets.

Encroachments turning Aabpara,Melody into ugly markets

Death anniversaryof Masroor Anwar

tomorrowISLAMABAD—The 17th deathanniversary of renowned lyricistof the Pakistani film industry,Masroor Anwar would be ob-served on April 1 (Monday).

Masroor Anwar was born in1944 in Simla,he was one of themost prominent lyricists of thePakistani film industry from 1962to 1990, having written songs forsuccessful films including HeeraAur Pathar, Arman, Doraha,Saiqa, Anjuman, Pehchan,Qurbani, Saughat and Bulandi,said a press release issued here.

Masroor Anwar also wrotesome of the most memorable pa-triotic numbers in the early ’70ssuch as Sohni Dharti AllahRakhay, Apni Jaan NazarKaroon, Watan Ki Mitti GawahRehna and Jug Jug Jiye MeraPyara Watan. He was also ascreen play and dialogue writerof considerable merit.

He died on April 1, 1996 inLahore. Anwar was posthu-mously awarded with the Prideof Performance by the Govern-ment of Pakistan.—APP

26 outlawsarrested

RAWALPINDI—Rawalpindi Po-lice have arrested 26 lawbreak-ers including three suspecteddacoits and 10 gamblers andseized 175 grams charras, sevenbottles of liquor, six pistols 30bore with 21 rounds, one revolver32 bore with five rounds, one re-peater 12 bore with 13 rounds andone rifle 7mm with four roundsfrom the possession of the ar-rested accused.

According to police spokes-man, Pirwadhai police arrestedAsad with 175 grams charras.Other accused were sent behindthe bars for having illegal weap-ons, drugs and liquor.

Meanwhile, Kahutta policeacting on a tip-off conducted araid at Mattor Chowk and caught10 gamblers namely Malik Khan,Ali, Daliar Khan, Abdullah,Liaquat, Noor Khan, Mushtaq,Saqib, Jameel and Sher Khanred-handed. Police recovered Rs97630 stake money and otheritems from their custody.—APP

ISLAMABAD—The ElectionCommission of Pakistan(ECP) is preparing to trainpolling staff for the May 11general elections with supportfrom the United Nations De-velopment Programme(UNDP) and the InternationalFoundation for Electoral Sys-tems (IFES).

At the launch of its train-ing program for master train-ers, the ECP demonstrated thepolling process which includesseveral new initiatives taken toincrease transparency and pub-lic confidence in the elections.Initiatives to be introduced at

polling stations in the upcomingelections include the use of elec-toral rolls with voters’ photo-graphs, new counting forms andtamper evident bags.

A mock polling station wasset up during the launch and thepolling process was demon-strated to guests and the media.A similar mock polling exercisewill be used to train over700,000 presiding officers, as-sistant presiding officers andpolling officers who will be en-gaged on 11 May throughout thecountry.

Marc-André Franche, Coun-try Director, UNDP in Pakistan,

said, “With these new measures,the polling process has im-proved significantly.

The new counting forms en-able much greater transparencyon voter turnout including re-cording gender-disaggregatedturnout.

The introduction of tamperevident bags to transport theseforms will help deter fraud andincrease public confidence.600,000 tamper evident bags arebeing provided by UNDP to theECP for these elections.”

UNDP is providing assis-tance to the Election Commis-sion of Pakistan in collaboration

with UN Women and the UNOffice for Project Services(UNOPS) in areas such astraining, results managementand voter education through athree year electoral cycle sup-port project supported by theGovernments of Australia,Norway and the EuropeanUnion.

With the support of UNDP,ECP has launched a voter edu-cation campaign targeted at in-clusion of youth and women,as well as a new elections re-sults management system forupcoming national and provin-cial elections.—INP

UNDP supports newinitiatives at polling stations

CITY REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Capital Devel-opment Authority (CDA) hasdecided to launch new sector“C” in federal capital.

Sources said CDA has de-cided to introduce sectors C-15and C-16 and take the posses-sion of required land immedi-ately on this count.

Sources said CDA has alsodecided to set up a new direc-torate under nomenclature ofstate management to address thecomplaints of inmates of resi-dential areas. In this connection

approval will be accorded to setup directorate of statement man-agement No 3.

Summary in this regard willsoon be received by members ofboard and elementary work willbe started in sectors c-15, C-16and D-13.

Following the launching ofnew sectors new directorate willensure initiation of steps for tak-ing immediate possession of theland of these sectors.

Land will be acquired bytaking the locals into confidenceand making them payment ofcompensation.

CDA to launch newsector C in federal capital

CITY REPORTER

RAWALPINDI—Dog Show,Girls sports, and singing com-petition were held on the 4thDay of Spring Festival at PirMehr Ali Shah Arid AgricultureUniversity (PMAS-AAUR) onSaturday.

The dog show organized byFaculty of Veterinary and Ani-mal Sciences of PMAS-AAURand people near about 50 dogswere brought for the show fromacross the city.

In Girls Sports, Tug of Warand Hander kerchief Snatchingwere held on the basis of inter-faculty basis.

In Tug of War, Faculty ofSciences got first position bybeating Faculty of AgricultureTeam, In Hand kerchiefSnatching Women Divisionteam got first position whileManagement Sciences got sec-ond position.

In Chaati race more than 20students participated, Sofia ofWomen Division and Nazia ofSciences Faculty got first andsecond positions, respectively.

In Singing competition,Kashif Hussain of AgricultureFaculty, Samiullah Qureshi ofManagement Sciences andSanaid Ikhalq of Faculty of Vet-erinary and Animal Sciences,

got first , second and third posi-tions, respectively.

PMAS-AAUR, Vice Chan-cellor, Prof. Dr. Rai Niaz Ahmadinaugurated the Dog Show andalso addressed on the GirlsSports event.

He said the university ad-ministration was making all outefforts to raise its academic andresearch indicators to competeat the international level.

Dr. Niaz urged them to fo-cus on their targets and futuristicgoals as there was no shortcut inlife. He stressed that graduatesshould keep their relation alivewith their alma mater and earngood name for it.

PMAS-AAUR hold dog show

Intermediate examfrom May 18CITY REPORTER

RAWALPINDI—The Punjab gov-ernment has delayed annual in-termediate examination in thewake of upcoming general elec-tions. A formal notification ofholding intermediate examsfrom May 18 across the prov-ince has been issued.

It may be noted that interexam was to be started fromMay 04 but due to the clash ofschedule with that of generalelections all educational boardsof Punjab have delayed interexams. According to the notifi-cation, inter exams would nowstart from May 18.

Work as if you own thecompany and soon you

just might.

— Mike Dolan

AMANULLAH KHAN

KARACHI—The Trade andindustry has appreciated thecaretaker government’s deci-sion to induct businessmen inprovincial caretaker cabinet.

Patron In-Chief KorangiAssociation of Trade and In-dustry S M Muneer, ChairmanMohammad Zubair Chhayaand Vice Chairmen NajmulArfeen and Niaz Ahmed saidthat the inclusion of business-men’ representatives in care-taker set up of Sindh provinceis a welcome move and the en-tire business community hasappreciated the decision to in-duct Sardar Yasin Malik,Khalid Tawab, Haroon Faruqi

Businessmen hail induction of traders in cabinetas caretaker ministers in Sindh’scabinet and Mian Zahid Hussainas Advisor.

They said that the businessrepresentatives taken in the cabi-net are well reputed and havevast experience in trade andcommerce besides having ad-ministrative experience. Theyare also known to their socialactivities and philanthropy andit is hoped that they would fullyshow their dedication to thecause of well being of the prov-ince, bringing in peace and tran-quility and most of all hold freeand fair elections in the prov-ince.

They also hoped that thecaretaker set up would strivehard to eliminate terrorism, ex-

tortion, kidnapping for ransomand bring normalcy in country’seconomic backbone – Karachi.While congratulating SardarYasin, Khalid Tawab and MianZahid Hussain they said theywould be having trade andindustry’s full cooperation intheir endeavours during theirtenure in the Sindh cabinet.

The vice Chairman Busi-nessmen Group (BMG) andformer President KarachiChamber of Commerce & In-dustry Haroon Farooki has beenappointed as the Advisor/ Min-ister of the caretaker Cabinet ofSindh Province.

Chairman, BusinessmenGroup & former President-KCCI, Siraj Kassam Teli, Vice

Chairmen & former Presidents-KCCI, Tahir Khaliq,Muhammad Zubair Motiwala,Anjum Nisar, President KarachiChamber of Commerce & In-dustry Muhammad HaroonAgar, Senior Vice PresidentShamim Firpo, Vice PresidentNasir Mehmood, ManagingCommittee Members of KCCIand BMGians have expressedcordial felicitations to HaroonFarooki, Vice Chairman Busi-nessmen Group & former Presi-dent-KCCI on his appointmentas the Advisor/Minister in thecaretaker provincial cabinet ofSindh. They also congratulatedthe Governor of Sindh Dr. IshratUl Ebad Khan and the caretakerChief Minister of Sindh Justice

(Retd) Zahid Qurban Alvi forappointing Haroon Farooki asthe Advisor/Minister in the in-terim Sindh Government.

They stated that HaroonFarooki, since last several de-cades, has been rendering pub-lic service to the business andindustrial community ofKarachi. He holds rich experi-ence and deep insight about theeconomic and commerce affairsof Pakistan and Sindh provinceand hoped that he will extendhis best meaningful support asthe Advisor/Minister to thecaretaker Chief Minister ofSindh in performance of theduties and responsibilities inthe interim government ofSindh. They also admired

Haroon Farooki’s selfless andsincere services to promotetrade and industry during histenure as the President KCCIand as sitting Vice Chairman ofruling Businessmen Group atKarachi Chamber of Com-merce & Industry.

Haroon Farooki in his state-ment to the press and mediaconveyed deep gratitude andcompliments to the Governor ofSindh Dr. Ishrat Ul Ebad Khanand the caretaker Chief Minis-ter of Sindh Justice (Retd)Zahid Qurban Alvi for repos-ing their confidence and nomi-nating him as the Advisor/Min-ister of the caretaker cabinet ofSindh province. He assured hisbest possible cooperation and

support to the caretaker ChiefMinister of Sindh and the cabi-net ministers to discharge theassigned duties and responsi-bilities with honesty and dedi-cation for the larger interest ofthe Sindh province.

Haroon Farooki is a re-nowned businessman and in-dustrialist of Karachi who is en-gaged in Public Service to pro-mote commerce and industryinKarachi and elsewhere sincelast several decades. Presently,he is also maintaining the port-folios as Member of FBR’s Al-ternate Dispute ResolutionCommittee on Sales Tax,KCCI-FBR Liaison Commit-tee, Member Scrutiny Commit-tee of Land Utilization Govern-

ment of Sindh, Trustee ofKarachi Port Trust and as per-manent Trustee of Ravian’sEducational Services TrustKarachi.

Earlier he served as Presi-dent KCCI, Chairman SITEAssociation of Industry, Mem-ber Managing CommitteeFPCCI, Member GoverningBody Sindh Employees SocialSecurity Institution (SESSI),Chairman All Pakistan Silk &Rayon Mills Association,President Karachi CustomsAgents Group. He also servedas Chairman of Old Ravian’sAssociation Karachi besidesheading various Sub-Commit-tees of Karachi Chamber andSITE Association.

STAFF CORRESPONDENT

FAISALABAD—Traders, In-dustrialists and Civil Societymembers expressed grave con-cern over the prolonged andunscheduled Electricity loadshedding, which is yieldingnegative impact over the In-dustrial Production and creat-ing severe unemployment inPunjab and its durationreached up to 18-20 hours aday.

In spite of gradual raise intemperature and changingweather conditions, TextileProcessing Industry especiallyin Punjab is still facing severe4 days Gas curtailment in aweek even in the month ofMarch. Temperature is raisedfrom winter season and furthermore domestic and commer-cial loads have also been re-duced up to their maximumextent.

Traders express concernover loadshedding

Talking to newsmen,Ajmal Farooq Chairman, AllPakistan Textile ProcessingMills Association said that theTextile Processing Industry inPunjab remained closed for154 days due to load sheddingof Gas since July-2012 and thesame situation is faced by theshortage of electricity because10 hours minimum load shed-ding is being observed.

Textile Processing Indus-try has a continuous process-ing and this curtailment mul-tiplies the damages. Industry isgoing sick day by day due tothis miserable condition, someunits are closed and many unitsare near to close. Due to thisshortage of Gas some unitshave been relocated their po-sition in Bangladesh and manyother units are also trying fortheir shifting.

The Textile Processing In-dustry is unable to ensure

betimes shipments to the glo-bal market due to hold ups inthe production process in thewake of Gas and Power cuts.The continued gas & electric-ity outages are inflicting be-tween $25 million and $30million loss every day on thetextile industry in Punjab.

Further more due to abovesituation, he said that our in-dustrialists are facing toughcompetition in the interna-tional market vis-a-vis otherneighbouring competitor coun-tries, like China, India, andBangladesh, even our industri-alists are demoralise and un-able to hold their labour.

In spite of bumper Cottoncrop was recorded in the coun-try but due to shortage of Gasand Electricity, the Textile Pro-cessing Industry is unable toconsume the crop for prepara-tion of the value-added prod-ucts.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Overseas In-vestors Chamber of Com-merce & Industry (OICCI)has proposed the FederalBoard of Revenue (FBR) toimplement reformed GeneralSales Tax (RGST) in budget2013-14, reduce sales taxfrom 16 to 12.5 percent, endSRO-culture, mandatory cashregisters for retailers and in-crease tax credit for foreigninvestors.

The FBR has receivedbudget proposals of the OCCIfor fiscal year 2013-14 focus-ing on a 5-year tax and rev-enue enhancement strategy,introduction of reforms andconditions for improving taxadministration in the country.

According to the propos-als, OCCI believes that tax re-forms and revenue generationis not possible in Pakistanwithout meeting certain basicconditions. The political lead-

OICCI for introducing RGSTand eliminating SRO culture

ership will have to undertakereform and hence parliament’sapproval and support is criti-cal. Secondly, tax reformsshould be an on-going processand tax policies should changeto adjust to changing economicstructures. Instead of puttingmuch emphasis on annual bud-

get exercise, FBR should de-velop, share and approve a 5-year tax and revenue enhance-ment strategy. All future spe-cific decisions should thenemanate from that strategy.

It said that there could notbe much disagreement on thefact that tax base needs to bebroadened. This implies thatall exemptions given for tax

and duty payments, other thanthose impacting the poorestsegment of the population andbasic commodities should bewithdrawn. A road mapshould be developed to elimi-nate all these exemptions andthe practice of issuing SROsshould be discontinued. It alsoproposed other measures forelimination of loopholes fortax avoidance and broadeningof tax base.

Firstly, the agriculturistsshould file income tax returnsand wealth statements. More-over withholding income taxmay be imposed on agriculturalproduce collected at the time ofprocurement. Secondly, all in-dividuals, traders and organiza-tions earning income in excessof the prevailing thresholdshould file income tax returnand statement of net wealth. Incase the earned income fallsunder the exempt category thenexemption may be claimedseparately.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Due tofavourable climate conditions,sufficient availability of agricul-tural inputs and best managementpractices, bumper wheat cropproduction of 25 million tons isexpected during the current year.

Different crop measuringindicators have shown signifi-cant improvement that indicatehealthier prospects for the year,Chief Agriculture Policy Insti-tute, Abdul Rauf Chaudhry said.

He said that as compared tothe last year, the balanced useof fertilizers would help grainformation to improve the peracre yield output. Another indi-cation of achieving bumperwheat crop is the improvementin N:P Ratio which is used forbalanced use of fertilizers likepotash and phosphors or nitro-gen as compared to the last year,he added.

He said that balance use ofthese two major inputs againstthe last year would help boost

Bumper Pakistan wheatcrop expected

the grain formation and cropoutput in the country.

He informed that the pricesof potash and phosphors de-creased during the period underreview which helped the farm-ers to use the balance of bothfertilizers for maximizing thefield output. API chief said that

N:P Ratio during last year wasrecorded at 4:1 which was im-proved and recorded at 3:1 dur-ing current crop sowing seasonwhich would put positive impacton the crop and per acre yield inthe country.

Use of certified seeds wasalso increased as about 20 per-cent certified seeds were avail-able for the growers, besides

sufficient availability of canalwater and other herbicides forwheat growers. Increase inwheat supports price up to Rs.1200 per 40 kg also encouragedthe farmers to increase the areaunder wheat cultivation whichwould result to produce morewheat than last year, he added.

Rauf Chaudhry said thatmost important factor whichdetermines the output of anycrop is weather conditions add-ing that regular rain fall duringthe months of January, Febru-ary and March also help toachieve a stable and healthycrop in the season. Due toabove mentioned factors, peracre yield is likely to improveby 5 percent for achievingbumper wheat crop of 25 mil-lion tons to fulfill the domesticrequirements as well as to ex-port, he added. It may be re-called that wheat sowing in thecountry for the crop season2012-13 registered an increaseof 0.44 percent and reached to8,688.2 thousand hectares.

TOKYO—Ambassador FarukhAmil has said that Pakistan pro-duces very high quality worldclass fruits and vegetables, withexcellent taste and will get apositive response from theJapanese people.

He was speaking to a del-egation of Sindh MangoGrowers from Pakistan andthe Japanese importers.

He said Pakistani man-goes were being successfullyexported to the Middle Eastand Europe and hoped thatthese would find a good mar-ket in Japan.

Ambassador Amil said Pa-kistani mangoes will attractthe Japanese market becauseof its special aroma, sweetnessand delicious taste, and hoped

Mango has hugepotential in Japan

that Pakistani mangoes will bemarketed in Japan this year.

The ambassador said despitea huge agriculture market in Ja-pan, Pakistani products werelargely absent which calls forunhindered efforts on the part ofPakistani exporters to find waysand means to increase and sus-tain exports in the world mar-kets. The Ambassador stressedthe need for pursuing the exportwith perseverance, packagingand presentation for marketingthe products in Japan and else-where in the world.

He urged the delegation tomeet the Japanese standards ofpackaging and assured the Pa-kistani businessmen and Japa-nese importers of Embassy’s fullassistance in marketing the man-

goes and other fruits and veg-etables to Japan.

Earlier Mahmood NawazShah on behalf of the visitingdelegation gave a briefingabout the quality and exportpotential of Pakistani mangoesto the world market in generaland Japan in particular. Ear-lier the delegation held meet-ings at the Ministry of Agricul-ture, Forestry and Fishery andNarita Airport Quarantine Au-thorities.

The delegation also visitedfresh fruit vegetables farmsand the famous Tokyo Metro-politan Ohta Fresh Market. Itwould visit a host of other ag-ricultural farms and orchardsin different parts of Kansai re-gion.—APP

New lubricant plantDUBAI—Ras Al KhaimahGovernment and HindujaGroup’s Gulf Oil Internationalhas commissioned Gulf RAK OilLLC, a state-of-the-art lubricantmanufacturing plant and greaseprocessing facility in RAKMaritime City. The plant wasinaugurated by His HighnessShaikh Saud Bin Saqr Al Qasimi,Member of the Supreme Counciland Ruler of Ras Al Khaimah, inthe presence of Shaikh NahyanBin Mubarak Al Nahyan,Minister of Culture, Youth andCommunity Development. Thelaunch of Gulf RAK Oil was alsoattended by Gopichand PHinduja, Co-Chairman, HindujaGroup of Companies, M. K.Lokesh, Ambassador of India tothe UAE.—Agencies

Oman inksexploration dealMUSCAT—Oman’s oilministry said on Wednesday itsigned an oil and gas explora-tion agreement with UsPetroTel Inc. as part of its planto increase the sultanate’scrude oil production. ?Underthe three-year agreement,PetroTel’s Omani unit willexplore for oil and natural gasin Blocks 39 and 67 located inDhofar, the ministry said in astatement. ?Oman, a produceroutside the Organisation of thePetroleum Exporting Countries(Opec), will not bear anyfinancial costs during theexploration period, theministry added. The country’soil production and condensatesincreased by 4 per cent to anaverage of 918,500 barrels perday in 2012, from a yearearlier, while its natural-gasproduction rose 3.3 per cent to98.2 million cubic meters aday during the same period.State-run Petroleum Develop-ment Oman, or PDO, whichaccounts for around 70 percent of the Sultanate’s crudeoutput, hopes to invest $11billion until 2022 on 16 largeoil projects, which will helpincrease its production by onebillion barrels.—Agencies

Pakistan offershuge trade

opportunitiesto Russia

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—Federation of Paki-stan Chambers of Commerceand Industry (FPCCI)emphasised on the need of ag-gressive interaction betweenbusiness community of Pakistanand Russia.

Both countries will lead toexpand bilateral trade and eco-nomic relations and PakistanRussia Business Council(PRBC) should play its due rolein this regard and facilitate itsmembers to penetrate the Rus-sian market, which has hugepotential for the Pakistani prod-ucts. During first meeting ofPRBC of FPCCI under thechairmanship of Farooq AfzalChairman PRBC, also attendedby Haji Fazal Kadir KhanSherani President FPCCI andAndrey V Demidov ConsulGeneral of Russia, Sherani sug-gested for holding Joint-Busi-ness Council meeting betweenthe two national chambers.

He advised PRBC mightschedule its future activities par-ticularly with reference to ex-change of trade delegation andorganising trade fairs and exhi-bitions on reciprocal basis.

Andrey Demidov assuredhis cooperation and assistance inthe activities of Council. He in-formed there was a great scopeof activities in every field be-tween the two countries.

Wyeth postsprofit of

Rs 76.83mSTAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—Wyeth PakistanLimited has posted the profit ofRs 76.83 million for threemonths, registering an increaseof 92.08 percent against Rs 40million in the same period of thelast year.

According to the result an-nounced by Wyeth Pakistan, theprofit of the Company has wit-nessed a rise due to a decline ofcost of sales, the expenses ofselling, marketing, distribution,administrative, other operatingexpenses and an increase of theoperating profit.

The cost of sales stood at Rs507.10 million in the currentyear, showing a decrease of 8.39percent against Rs 549.68 mil-lion in the same period of lastyear. Similarly, selling, market-ing and distribution expenses ofthe Company recorded at Rs79.81 million for three monthsagainst Rs 80.11 million in thesame period of last year.

While the administrative ex-penses have registered a declineof 27.48 percent from Rs 22.19million in the current year toRs.17.41 million in the last year.In the same way, other operatingexpenses of the Company hasshown the decrease of 17.23 per-cent to Rs 9.80 million in 2013from Rs 11.49 million in 2012.

Besides the operating profithas witnessed the increase of50.05 percent in the current yearand it stood at Rs 107.63 mil-lion against Rs 71.72 million inthe last year. The Company hasposted Rs 54.05 earning pershare (EPS) for three month ofthe current year, which was upby 92.07 percent when com-pared it with Rs 28.14 EPS ofthe last year.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—The FederalBoard of Revenue will submitspecific taxation proposals ofincome tax and sales tax toPrime Minister former JusticeMir Hazar Khan Khoso for gen-erating additional revenue tomeet the collection target dur-ing current fiscal year.

Prime Minister Khoso hassought new proposals from theFBR in 3-4 days to augment rev-enue collection during 2012-13.

The PM has given these di-rections to the FBR while re-viewing the current revenuesituation during a briefing givento him by the FBR at the PrimeMinister’s Secretariat. TheFBR’s new proposals would fo-cus on revenue generation toovercome revenue shortfall in2012-13.

FBR preparing specifictaxation proposals for govt

The FBR team of tax man-agers admitted before the PrimeMinister that the Board is fac-ing an uphill task to meet the

revised revenue collection targetfor 2012-13, sources said.

Chairman FBR Ali ArshadHakim informed the Prime Min-ister that due to narrow tax base,fall in imports and the overallsituation in the country, the FBRis experiencing difficulties inattaining the tax targets set bythe government.

The Prime Minister was in-formed that the revenue targetwhich was set at Rs 2,381 bil-lion for the current financial yearwas scaled down to Rs 2,126billion.

The Prime Minister was in-formed that Rs 1,210 billion hasso far been collected and effortsare being made to ensure that theset target is achieved.

He said the need for fi-nances cannot be overempha-sized and directed that the FBRshould make all-out efforts toattain the revised target.

The PM observed that therevenue collected by the FBR sofar warrants immediate attentionand necessary measure needs tobe taken to meet the targets. Themeeting was attended by the se-nior officials of the PrimeMinister’s Secretariat, the FBRand the Ministry of Finance.

STAFF REPORT

ISLAMABAD—Pakistan hastaken lead in the region bymanufacturing globally re-nowned product from Toyotafamily, the first locally as-sembled true Sports Utility Ve-hicle (SUV) ‘Fortuner’ and sav-ing customers around Rs 4 mil-lion as they have to spend onimport of the same model, IndusMotor Company (IMC) CEOParvez Ghias said.

He said if the same modelis imported from Thailand it willcost over Rs 9 million while inPakistan the price tag is Rs 5.2million. He said it is a big slashand shows the commitment oflocal Original Equipment Manu-facturers (OEMs) how they havebeen working day in, day out toprovide benefits to its custom-ers. He said around 2,500 unitswill be sold as per the currentdemand.

He added that although, thedemand of small cars is high butcustomers’ budget constraintdoes not allow us to manufac-ture small cars, while giving thereason he said IMC studied three

Customers to save Rs4mon IMC’s SUV: Ghias

cars of Toyota and Daihatsu, butit could not find it feasible forthe local assembly as it wouldcost over Rs 1.0 million. Paki-stani customers don’t want topush their budget line upwardfor small cars.

He said there are also somehindrances, which have impededthe growth of local industry in-cluding sudden shift in govern-ment policies and high inputcost. Moreover, import of usedcars and government’s deviationfrom long-term policies has bentthe bone of local industry.

He said it is obvious that localmanufacturing not only saves theeconomy but also strengthens themacroeconomic indicators so heexpressed hope that interim gov-ernment would facilitate institu-tions and public for the transitionof new set-up and long-term policyfor the auto industry will befinalised by the new regime. Healso informed that the governmentis planning to introduce the Auto-mobile Industrial Policy (AIP) for2013-2018 in place of Auto Indus-try Development Plan (AIDP).

“IMC adhering to its com-mitment to develop the local

auto industry of Pakistan willcontinue to offer new, qualityproducts and increase thelocalisation through continuoustransfer of technology,” Ghiassaid.

He further said, “It repre-sents one more significant steptowards fulfilling IMC’s com-mitment towards Pakistan’smarket. We value the passionand trust given to Toyota by ourlocal customers.”

Fortuner is equipped withhi-tech safety and security fea-tures such as Anti-lock BrakeSystem (ABS) and SRS airbags.It has been installed with sevenindependent seat belts withheight adjustment for driver andthe front passenger with sevenreclining seats and ample stor-age space.

Fortuner’s advanced enter-tainment system is equipped withseven inches touch screen, built-in steering switches includingsix-speaker configuration andBluetooth for hands-free calling.The prestigious style and finesseof the Fortuner’s exterior isseamlessly carried through to theinterior of the vehicle.

PQ shipping activityKARACHI—Four shipsarrived at Port Qasim to load/offload containers at QICT,palm oil at LCT, chemical atEVTL, cement at MW-3 onFriday, port sources said hereSaturday. Berth occupancywas maintained at 79% at theport on Friday where a total ofeleven ships namely M.VKPS-I Alican Bey- Powership,M.V Kuksa-N, M.T AtlanticGlory, M.V Lantau Arrow,M.V Msclenvina, M.V NYKKai, M.T Lahore, M.T FairChem Steed, M.T Variety,M.V Mercy Wisdom, M.VMaori Maiden are currentlyoccupying berths to load/offload containers, palm oil,cement, wheat, furnace oil,chemical, rice. Cargo handlingoperations were carried outsmoothly at the port where acargo volume 110662 tonnescomprising 66685 tonnesimport, 43977 tonnesexport.—APP

Gold Tezab 51385.00Silver Tezabi 891.42

Gold Tezabi (24-Ct) 51090.00Gold 22 Ct 46710.00SilverTezabi 970.00Silver Thobi 895.00

USA 98.30 98.10

UK 149.50 149.20

EURO 126.10 125.85

Canada 96.76 96.55

Switzerland 103.58 103.37

Australia 102.40 102.20

Sweden 15.09 15.05

Japan 1.0446 1.0425

Norway 16.85 16.81

Singapore 79.29 79.13

Denmark 16.91 16.88

Omani Riyal 255.00 245.00

Saudi Arabia 26.21 26.16

Hong Kong 12.66 12.16

Kuwait 344.55 343.85

Malaysia 31.83 31.76

Newzeland 82.22 82.06

Qatar 27.00 26.94

UAE 26.76 26.71

KR WON 0.0884 0.0882

Thailand 3.356 3.349

New limitsproposed on

mortgage loansAB U DH A B I—A newstudy suggests that theCentral Bank’s originalproposed mortgage capwould have a wider nega-tive impact on Dubai’sGDP, the UAE’s GDP andinvestments in Dubai’s realestate sector.

The Central Bank’s newlimits on mortgage loans dis-cussed last week may saveDubai and the UAE a poten-tial GDP loss of up to 5.71per cent and 1.43 per centrespectively. A loss whichwould have resulted from theregulator’s original propos-als.

A new study, conductedby international managementand investment advisory firmGeopolicity, suggests that theCentral Bank’s original pro-posed mortgage cap wouldhave a wider negative impacton Dubai’s GDP, the UAE’sGDP and investments inDubai’s real estate sector —not just on banks’ profitabil-ity.—Agencies

China ordersstringent watch

on AppleBEIJING—Apple is to face“strengthened supervision”from China’s consumerwatchdogs, state media re-ported on Friday, as the UScomputer giant is hit by abarrage of negative publicityand court cases in the coun-try.

China is Apple’s sec-ond-biggest market, and itsiPhones and other products— many of them made inthe country — are highlypopular, although it facesfierce competition fromSouth Korea’s Samsung.

State media have carrieda series of attacks againstApple, with the People’sDaily, the CommunistParty’s official mouthpiece,running critical items for fiveconsecutive days over al-leged double standards incustomer service and returnspolicies.

Apple has denied thoseaccusations in statements toChinese media but the con-demnations have continuedunabated, with the newspa-per urging consumers to“strike away Apple’s unpar-alleled arrogance” in one ofits commentaries.

The State Administrationfor Industry and Commerce(SAIC) has asked tradingstandards bodies across thecountry to step up “contractsupervision” on electronicsmanufacturers “such asApple”, the People’s Dailysaid on Friday.

“Local governments arerequired to... investigate andpunish illegal activities inaccordance with the law,” itquoted the SAIC as saying inan official note.

An SAIC spokesmanwho declined to be namedconfirmed the existence ofthe document to AFP butdeclined to disclose de-tails.—Agencies

SIALKOT: Ambassador of Austria Axel Wech addressing the members of Sialkot Chamberof Commerce and Industry.

Cyprus workson tax levy dealNICOSIA—Cyprus’s govern-ment was working on a proposalto soften the blow of a bank de-posit levy on smaller saversahead of a parliament vote on themeasure central to a euro zonebailout designed to avert bank-ruptcy.

Breaking with previous EUpractice that depositors’ savingsare sacrosanct, Cyprus and in-ternational lenders agreed at theweekend that savers in theisland’s outsized banking sys-tem would take a hit in returnfor the offer of 10 billion euros($13 billion) in aid.

That not only infuriatedCypriots, it unnerved depositorsin the euro zone’s weaker econo-mies and investors fearing a pre-cedent that could reignite mar-ket turmoil.—Newswire

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—In an effort toensure the timely completionof much-awaited review ofcountry’s existing corporatelaw, the Chairman, Securitiesand Exchange Commission ofPakistan (SECP), MuhammadAli has established a dedicatedsecretariat with a sole objec-tive of drafting a new corpo-rate law.

The new corporate lawwould serve as a specially tai-lored solution to the specificneeds of Pakistan’s corporatesector and cater to the aspira-tions of entrepreneurs and in-vestors alike.

The secretariat, located at

Chairman SECP rejuvenates corporate law review projectthe SECP’s headquarters, willwork closely in coordinationwith the Corporate Law ReviewCommission (CLRC), formed in2005 under the chair of Mr. Jus-tice (retd) Ajmal Mian to under-take a review of corporate law.

It is pertinent to mentionhere that the CLRC has lost theinitial momentum due to vari-ous extraneous reasons but thecurrent Chairman of SECP Mr.Muhammad Ali, having recog-nized the extreme importance ofthis monumental task, has reju-venated the project.

The Chairman SECP be-lieves that at the heart of anyeconomy lies a solid, flexibleand enabling company law andit is the foremost priority of the

SECP to maintain a frameworkthat is modern, competitive andforward-looking – one whichfacilitates enterprise and ensurestransparency.

A dedicated team of legaland technical resources has beenbrought in to work on the projectboasting a range of foreignqualifications and intensive ex-perience in legislative draftingas well as specialist knowledgeof company law administration.Consultative and planning meet-ings with the members of theCLRC have been held at everystage and the Commission hasdetermined challenging yet re-alistic deadlines to achieve thismomentous goal.

The Corporate Law Review

Commission has been engagedin in depth research into variousinternational corporate lawmodels of economic signifi-cance and renown such as theUS State of Delaware – homeof more than 60% of Fortune500 companies, the recent Com-panies Act 2006 of the UnitedKingdom, the new Indian DraftBill and the corporate law re-gimes in most major tradinghubs in the Asia-Pacific regionincluding Australia, NewZealand, Hong Kong, Malaysiaand Singapore. A meticulousand extensive comparativeanalysis of these models hasbeen undertaken in order toidentify and study key innova-tions and their utility for increas-

ing capitalisation andliberalising the market.

Building upon feedbackfrom the extensive public con-sultation carried out previously,the new secretariat has beentasked to slew of material pro-duced by the Commission. TheSecretariat will coordinate withCLRC, gathered the feedbackfrom stakeholders and finalizedthe draft of new corporate law.

The defining theme of thisrevamp is twofold – the SECPenvisions a law that is accessibleand streamlined, with a focus onmaking the setting up of a com-pany and starting business as con-venient and small investor friendlyas possible without sacrificing onthe flexibility and sophistication

demanded by larger corporations.The goal is to have a smooth, ef-ficient, speedy process that willencourage small business ownersto incorporate and help themutilise the advantages of formalorganisation and to lay down ascheme of regulation that is fair,open and transparent in order tobuild a culture of trust and integ-rity in the market.

A robust and flexiblemechanism for shareholder par-ticipation is aimed for that willstimulate small investors intotaking a pro-active role in man-agement as well as implement-ing more rationalized financialand audit requirements forsmaller and family owned busi-nesses while enforcing an inter-

national standard of reportingfor larger corporations.

The SECP strongly be-lieves in a tailored approach asopposed to simply followingany one jurisdiction as has beenthe historic practice. To this end,the SECP is considering new,more flexible and more facili-tative forms of business ve-hicles and means of providingcompetitive tools for capitaliza-tion and market participation.The SECP is also consideringIslamic forms of business andinvestment models – all with theaim of providing a well thoughtout framework that is specifi-cally tailored to the particulardemands and aspirations of themarket.

OBSERVER REPORT

MULTAN—Multan ElectricPower Company (Mepco) andother Discos have issued elec-tricity bill with new tariff whichcaused unrest among the indus-trial as well domestic consum-ers.

The industrialists havestrongly opposed the hike inpower tariff by National Elec-tric Power Regulatory Author-ity (Nepra), saying this devel-opment would not let the indus-try progress.

Multan Chamber of Com-merce and Industry (MCCI)President Muhammad KhanSaddozai has out rightly rejectedthe increase of 1.55/unit in elec-tricity tariff from January 1, asannounced by Nepra on thegrounds that it was detrimentalfor the industries whose survivalis already at stake due to con-tinuous increase in power tariffby the government on one pre-

Revised power tariffirks consumers

text or the other.He said the government had

increased power tariff by 150percent in the last five years andsome 26 percent during the lastone-year.

Taking a strong exception ofthe new tariff of Nepra appli-cable from January 1, he saidindustries were already suffer-ing and now with that increasein tariff industries were about toshutdown.

He said the business was de-clining due to inflationary pres-sure but the government was fol-lowing the International Mon-etary Fund and World Bank’s dic-tations blindly. The new tariffrates, allowed by Nepra, havecome at a time when the govern-ment was going and all economicindicators of the country arenegative. The industries arestruggling for survival; exportersare trying to face new challengesand competitions through cost-cutting measures.

In the backdrop of such ascenario Nepra should have in-sisted that discos must improvetheir efficiency and cut down itsdistribution and line losses. Suchstrong corrective measures canonly offset the subsidy that thefederal government has with-drawn. Continuous increase intariff would only promote dis-satisfaction, he asserted.

He further said the industrywas the biggest consumer ofDiscos with about lakhs of elec-tricity connections and was thereal source of generating rev-enue for Discos, but if continu-ous loadshedding was takingplace how the utility could in-crease revenue.

He also stressed that indus-try consisted of mostly export-oriented industries and export-ers materialised their orders inadvance and under the circum-stances increase in utility tariffsabruptly converts profit-makingindustries into loss.

STAFF REPORTER

ISLAMABAD—The Indus RiverSystem Authority (Irsa) has pro-jected a six per cent water short-age in early Kharif season andadvised provinces to delay cul-tivation by two weeks till icestarts melting.

However, there will be nowater shortagein middle andlate Kharif sea-son as the coun-try will have 10MAF more wa-ter than the pre-vious year.

This is thecrux of a meet-ing of Irsa Advi-sory committeewhich met under Chairman ofIrsa Asjad Imtiaz Ali to decidethe availability and distributionof water for provinces during theupcoming Kharif season. MajorKharif crops are cotton, sugar-cane and rice.

The committee noted that

Water shortage duringKharif season imminent

the country would lose 25 percent of total water availableduring because of systemlosses.

Irsa observed that 110 Mil-lion Acre Feet (MAF) waterwould be available for Kharifseason, of which 23 MAF wa-ter would be lost.

The committee said that in

Jehlum and Chenab zones, theloss will be 10 per cent in theearly Kharif season and 15 percent in late kharif season. In theIndus zone, the water loss wouldbe as much as 40 per cent, itnoted.

It said that 67.25 MAF wa-

ter would be available in canalsfor provinces. The body ob-served that the country wouldface 6 per cent water shortagein the early Kharif season.

The committee decided thatprovinces would be given wateraccording to their needs as thecountry would have more waterthan the previous season. How-

ever, if thecountry faceswater shortages,p r o v i n c e swould be takenon board toshare it, thecommittee said.The countrywould have acarryover stock11.5 MAF of

water. Later, Irsa’s spokespersonKhalid Idrees Rana said that 10MAF water would be releasedin Kotri downstream.

He said that Punjab wouldget 33.6 MAF water and Sindh30.25 MAF water for Kharifcrops.

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—ACCA Pakistanorganised a discussion forumon Making capital marketswork in Pakistan.

The event was based ontwo research reports recentlyreleased by ACCA: The Riseof Capital Markets in Emerg-ing and Frontier Economiesand Making capital marketswork in emerging and frontiereconomies. The first report re-views the academic literatureon the development of capitalmarkets, while the other is acollection of first-hand ac-counts and case studies fromsenior managers and profes-sionals spearheading marketdevelopment.

Rehanuddin, Head ofACCA Karachi in his opening

ACCA holds forumremarks welcomed all the par-ticipants and gave an overviewof the published research re-ports. Speaking about thefledgling capital markets inemerging and frontier econo-mies, Rehan said: Investorscannot be expected to assumethe risk that comes with invest-ing in what is often a novel andilliquid asset class without thebest quality information pos-sible; and they cannot be ex-pected to participate in mar-kets where crucial informationremains private.This is whypolicymakers and the accoun-tancy profession around theworld have long championedthe value of disclosure and as-surance and must continue todo so.

The speakers at the forumincluded Imran Iqbal

Panjwani, Executive DirectorSECP, Haroon Askari, DMDKarachi Stock Exchange,Fazal Hussain Gaffoor, CFOCDC and Badiuddin Akbar,COO NCCPL. Each of thespeakers shared with the au-dience some very interestingcase studies about what theirorganisation have done to playa part in the development ofcapital markets in Pakistan.

The purpose of this eventwas to provide a platform fordiscussion and debate on keyissues and to providepolicymakers, regulators,leading capital market institu-tions and accountants withinthe region an opportunity toshare their experiences onsome of the significant capi-tal market reforms which haveworked in Pakistan.

Efforts to boostAustria-Pakistan

bilateral tradeSTAFF REPORTER

SIALKOT—Austrian Ambassa-dor to Pakistan Axel Wech hassaid that there are wide possi-bilities of enhancing two waytrades between Austria and Pa-kistan.

At present trade volume be-tween the two countries is about200 million euro and effortswould be to increase the tradevolume, he said.

Addressing the members ofSialkot Chamber of Commerceand Industry (SCCI) he said theunstable government polices,security, law and order situationare the major obstacles in thepromotion of trade betweenAustria and Pakistan.

We will consider positivelyappointing honorary counsellorin Sialkot to facilitate its busi-ness community, he revealed.The Ambassador further saidthat Austrian business commu-nity is very conscious about thestandard of products and qual-ity control and urged upon thebusiness community of Sialkotthey should concentrate on im-proving the standard of productsand ensure quality control.

On this occasion, he askedthe Sialkot Chamber to consti-tute a trade delegation to visitAustria and in this regard allpossible support and coopera-tion would be extend.

SALIM AHMED

LAHORE—Expressing con-cerns over slow economicgrowth and increasing fiscaldeficit, the Lahore Chamberof Commerce and Industryhas said that the country’seconomy is at a high risk andremains vulnerable to internaland external shocks.

The LCCI PresidentFarooq Iftikhar said that thecontinuous increase in fiscaldeficit will pull country’seconomy towards majordownturn, which is already inprecarious condition due tovarious core issues that needto be addressed on urgent ba-sis. He, however, said that thetwo main reasons for increasein the deficit is inability to

LCCI concerned overslow economic growth

control expenditures and lackof a plan to generate higherrevenue in view of sever en-ergy crisis.

The LCCI President sug-gested to the government tolower the interest rates aslowering by a single pointsaves Rs 100 billion for thegovernment as major chunk ofthe government borrowing isfrom domestic means.

He further added that lossmaking Public Sector Enter-prises (PSEs) are damagingthe economy by Rs 500 bil-lion per annum but govern-ment could save RS 200 bil-lion by applying good gover-nance practices in PSEs forthe time being. We request thefederal government to takeprudent decisions without

wasting further time in thelarger interest of the country.The current account deficitcould also be reduced by atleast Rs 300 billion by main-taining and regulating publicspending and pursuing asound fiscal policy.

Farooq Iftikhar said thatfiscal deficit could also be low-ered by increasing the Govern-ment revenue for which effec-tive measures were needed toexpand the tax base by bring-ing all sectors under tax net. Hesaid that there is no doubt thatthe situation is compounded byan uncertain global environ-ment and a difficult domesticsituation but it is also extremelyimportant that all economicpolicies in vogue at the momentbe reviewed afresh in totality.

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—The export of sugaris still and on a slow to mediumpace due to declining pricetrend in the international mar-ket, said a spokesman of Paki-stan Sugar Mills Association(PSMA) said. The governmenttherefore came up with certainincentives in the shape of Fed-eral Excise Duty (FED) and theinland freight subsidy to facili-tate sugar export and to enablethe sugar industry to pay off thegrower’s dues.

In 2011-12 Pakistan hasproduced 4.670 million tonnesof sugar. After adding the carryforward of 2010-11 the totalavailability thus come to 5.8million tonnes. The domestic

Export of sugar continuesrequirement was estimated at4.2 to 4.3 million tonnes. Thisleaves a carry forward/surplusof about 1.5-1.6 million tonnesfor year 2012-13. Again theyear 2012-13 was a good sugarcrop having a crop size ofmore than 60 million tonnesand it was estimated about 4.7-4.8 million tonnes of sugarwould be produced and thusthe total availability standsabove six million tones,spokesman added.

After the export of allocatedquantity sufficient quantitywould still be available in thepipeline for domestic use esti-mated at about 4.3 milliontonnes for 2012-13. Provincialgovernments have fixed the sug-arcane price at Rs 170-172/40

kgs and the crushed value of thecrop was estimated at more thanRs 215 billion.

The grower’s payment isprime issue, the high cost of sug-arcane and the pile up sugarstock build up pressure on thedomestic sugar industry. Thismatter was discussed in themeeting of Sugar AdvisoryBoard, which was attended byall stakeholders including thegrower’s representatives, andafter then the export was al-lowed. Trading Corporation ofPakistan (TCP) has bought500,000 tonnes of sugar asbuffer stock for sales to UtilityStores. TCP is required by aCabinet decision to maintain abuffer stock of 500,000 tonnesat all times.

Lint tradingSTAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—Dull trading pre-vailed with firm spot rate amidfine lint in focus, traders at theKarachi Cotton Association(KCA) said.

The KCA kept the spot rateunchanged at Rs 6,900 permaund, floor brokers said.

During the trading session,mills in Sindh and Punjab sta-tions made deals for all gradeson back of shrinking stocks be-sides to meet immediate need offine lint, floor brokers said.

Sellers and buyers remainedentangled in price war in majorstations of Sindh and Punjabwhile prices of fine lint remainedhigher on back of shrinkingstocks, floor brokers said.

Spinners purchased allgrades on competitive prices ataround Rs 6,275 per maund toRs 6,475 per maund while millsmade deals for fine grades inPunjab stations at around Rs6,975 per maund, traders said.

Trading in Karachi marketremained firm as several dealschanged hands at around Rs 6,750per maund to Rs 6,900 per maundon growing demand for all grades.

Sellers withholding finegrades asked slightly higherprices for their stocks on backof shrinking fine grades, as somedeals changed hands at aroundRs 7,300 per maund in Sindhstations, floor brokers said.

Buyers in major stations ofSindh and Punjab also made for-ward deals for all grades of lintat around Rs 6,475 per maundto Rs 6,900 per maund, depend-ing on grades.

ISTANBUL—Turkey exportedalmost $120 million worth ofgold to Iran in February, datashowed, suggesting the twocountries’ trade of gold fornatural gas has resumed de-spite tighter US sanctions,though at levels below lastyear’s peaks.

US officials have sought toprevent Turkish gold exportsfrom providing a financial life-line to Tehran, which has beenlargely frozen out of the globalbanking system by Westernsanctions over its nuclearprogramme.

Turkey sold no gold to Iranin January, according to datafrom the Turkish Statistics In-stitute (TUIK), as banks anddealers eyed the Feb 6 imple-mentation of US sanctions thattightened control over preciousmetal sales.

The United States has givenTurkey a six-month waiver ex-empting it from sanctions on

Turkey export gold toIran braving sanctions

trade with Iran, which is due toexpire in July, but banks anddealers still have been cautious.Turkey sold $117.9 millionworth of gold to Iran last month,while exports to the United ArabEmirates, which has served inthe past as a transit route toTehran, rose to $402.3 millionfrom $371 million in January,TUIK data showed.

“Due to the sanctions, no-body wants to attract attention.That may be the reason why ex-ports stopped to Iran in January,”said one Istanbul gold trader,asking not to be named.

“However, trade with Irancontinues; there will always betransfers. Looking at this year’sfigures, the February exports toIran are quite low, so it shouldn’tcause issues.”

Turkey’s monthly gold salesto Iran peaked last July at $1.8billion, more than 10 times theamount exported to Tehran lastmonth. Turkey, Iran’s biggest

natural gas customer, has beenpaying Iran for energy importswith Turkish lira, because sanc-tions prevent it from paying indollars or euros.

Iranians then use those lira,held in Halkbank accounts, tobuy gold in Turkey, and couri-ers carry bullion worth millionsof dollars in hand luggage toDubai, where it can be sold forforeign currency or shipped toIran.

Turkey is heavily dependenton imported energy and, whileit has cut back on oil purchasesfrom Iran, has made clear it can-not simply stop buying Iranianoil and gas.

Iran is refining uranium toa fissile concentration thatWestern experts say is a rela-tively short technical step fromthe level that would be suitablefor atomic bombs. Tehran saysits enrichment programme issolely for civilian energy pur-poses.

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—Former federal in-formation minister Javed Jabbarhas said that corporateorganisations have started con-tribution in social developmentwhich is a good omen but theyneed to do more in this regard.

This he said while address-ing at the 5th international sum-mit on CSR 2013 organised byNational Forum for Environ-ment (NFEH) with the supportof United Nations EnvironmentProgramme, Karachi chamberof commerce, Institute of Costand Management Accountantsof Pakistan.

He said that corporate sec-

Jabbar highlights role ofcorporate sector

tor gives lot of jobs and alsospending on education, healthand training of people. CSRshould be linked to corporatefiscal responsibility andorganisations should file theirtax returns, he said.

FPCCI and other big orga-nizations should make a state-ment that how much money cor-porate sector is contributing insocial development.

A low amount of money isbeing spent on social scienceresearch, which should beraised, he stressed. Jabbar saidthat Zulfikarabad project hasbeen launched without conduct-ing basic environment assess-ment. We pointed out authorities

but they did not respond posi-tively, he added.

FBR has declared that 300textile mills are not paying taxreturns in due manner.Organisations must pay tax re-turns so as to ensure their contri-bution in social sector develop-ment, Javed Jabbar concluded.

Muhammad Haroon Agar,President KCCI, said severalorganisations are providing foodand other social services to peoplein Karachi. He said that Pakistanbureaucracy do not want oureconomy to grow. He said CSR canbe simply defined as achievingcommercial success in ways thathonour ethical values and respectpeople, communities.

AN expectant father’s psychologicaldistress may be linked to histoddler’s emotional and behavioral

development. The finding came from newresearch published in the journal Pediat-rics which analyzed over 31,000 Norwegiankids and their parents.

Several previous stud-ies have shown that themental health of a mother,during and after her preg-nancy, may have an effecton the health of the child.One study showed thatchildren’s early experienceswith a mother suffering froma severe mental illness caninfluence their long-termhealth and development.Anne Lise Kvalevaag, lead-ing researcher and a doc-toral candidate in psychol-ogy at the University ofBergen in Norway, said:

“The results of thisstudy point to the fact thatthe father’s mental healthrepresents a risk factor forchild development, whereas the traditionalview has been that this risk in large is repre-sented by the mother. The father’s mentalhealth should therefore be addressed bothin research and clinical practice.”

The team of experts interrogated thedads when the moms were 4 to 5 monthspregnant. They were asked about their men-tal health, for instance, whether they felt de-pressed or afraid. Rather than looking at par-ticular diagnoses in kids, the scientists col-lected information on whether they had ex-perienced frequent mood shifts, got intofights, or had feelings of anxiety, explained

Father’s mental healthlinked to child’s behaviour

Kvalevaag. High levels of psychologicaldistress were reported by 3% of the dads.The team discovered a link between themental health of the father and the devel-opment of a child.

The children who had the most emo-tional issues at age 3 were the ones whose

dads were the most dis-tressed. The researcherspointed out that this studydid not demonstrate a directcause-and-effect associa-tion.

The authors ex-plained that there are vari-ous possible means thatmay account for the rela-tionship. For example,Kvalevaag explained, thefathers may be passing ona genetic risk to the child.The mental health of thesoon-to-be mom could alsobe influenced by the dad’sdepression, therefore,causing an effect on the un-born baby, suggested an-other scientist.

“If a father is highly distressed,that could affect the mom’s secretionof hormones during pregnancy, i tcould affect her sleep, her own mentalstatus,” said Daniel Armstrong, pro-fessor of pediatrics and director of theMailman Center for Child Developmentat the Universi ty of Miami MillerSchool of Medicine.

“The prenatal mental state of the fa-ther is likely to predict the postnatal men-tal health of the father and this may alsoaccount for some of the associationsfound,” Kvalevaag revealed.

KARACHI: President PML-F Pir Pagaro talking to media persons regarding the an-nouncement of the decision of PML-N leader Sardar Raheem to join PML-F.

KARACHI: Dr Fauzia Siddiqi coming to city court for submitting nomination papers for NA-250.

KARACHI: Residents of Madho Goth hold a demonstration in support of their demands.

IRFAN ALIGI

KARACHI—The target killerscontinued to operate fear-lessly here Satruday. In NorthNazimabad near Board of sec-ondary Education Karachi,unidentified armed men at-tacked a van of City Wardensthree Wardens sustained bul-let injuries and were shifted tothe Abbasi Shaheed Hospital.However, 2 of the injured CityWardens succumbed to theirinjuries. The third was in criti-cal condition.

The target killers had Sat-urday gunned down 2 persons

Two wardens die in targetattack, high value gangster killed

in Sohrab Goth and OrangiTown areas.

The terrorists gunneddown Sami Khan near Al-AsifSquare near Sohrab Goth onSuper Highway.

The victim had died on thespot and his body was shiftedto hospital. In Orangi Townnear Sabri Chowk, unidentifiedarmed men killed a man whoseidentity was yet to be ascer-tained. In an encounter withSindh Rangers, an alleged highvalue target belonging toPeople’s Amn Committee,Aqeel Commando was killed byRangers in Liyari. The residents

of Liyari staged a protest atChawkiwara with the body ofthe deceased.During the tar-geted operation in Liyari, therewas an exchange of firing,which left one Rangers person-nel and 2 criminals injured.Rangers had on a tip off cor-doned off the Shah Baig Laneof Liyari and started door-t-door-search and arrested sev-eral suspects. Those arrestedduring the targeted operationwere allegedly involved in themurder of a local trader of Em-press Market in Saddar. Rang-ers also conducted targetedoperation in Shanti Nagar.

STAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—The differencesamong the followers of dif-ferent religions were beingcreated by the opportuniststhat wanted to inflict colos-sal damage to Pakistan. How-ever, the Christian, TheHindu and the Sikh that livedin Pakistan also loved thecountry with same enthusi-asm as other Pakistanis did.There were some enemiesthat always wanted to createriots on the basis of religionbut the civil society a s wholehad rejected the frustratedfanatics and the non-Muslimminorities would continue toserve the country and wouldplay their roles in making thecountry stronger.

Sat Guru Nawal Founda-

No differences among Muslimsand non-Muslims: Partab

tion founder President VijeshPartab expressed theseviews while talking to a del-egation of Hindu youth Fri-day at the office of the foun-dation.

Partab said that the Mus-lim especially of the countryas compared to Muslim ofany other country were morefriendly and had no differ-ences with any other minor-ity and always extended theirsupport to the Hindus andthe Christians in times oftheir hardship and on theoccasion of their religiousrituals and festivals and samewas reciprocated.

He said that the incidentof Badami Bagh was a mani-fest of wickedness of the frus-trated elements and it shouldnot be taken as the manifest

of the mindset of the entirePakistani nation, which al-ways hated violence.

He urged the Hindu youththat they should focus on ac-quiring advanced learning sothat they could contribute tothe development and progressof the country and send a mes-sage across the world thatthere were no differencesamong the Muslim and non-Muslim Pakistanis. He saidthat the non-Muslim Pakistanienjoyed full liberty to celebratetheir religious rituals and hadopen opportunities to acquirejobs and educations in anyacademic institution. Partab onthe occasion, extended hiscordial greetings and well-wishes to the Christian frater-nity regarding their religiousritual, the Easter.

KARACHI: Kaleem Farooqi, Akera Ochi, Consel General of Japan, Abdul Qadir Jaffarand others during the dinner reception.—PO photo by Sultan Chaki

Altaf deploreskilling of school

PrincipalSTAFF REPORTER

K A R A C H I — M u t t a h i d aQaumi Movement (MQM)Chief Altaf Hussain deploredthe killing of a school princi-pal in a grenade attack inBaldia Town, Karachi for re-fusing to pay extortionmoney.He expressed his griefon the killing of the principaland wounding of severalstudents and said that theterrorists had no regard evenfor the sanctity of educa-tional institutions. Thepeace-loving citizens mustraise their voice against thedastardly attack, he urged.

He prayed for the speedyrecovery of the woundedstudents and for the divineblessings on the soul of thedeceased principle.

He appealed to PresidentAsif Zardari and Prime Min-ister Mir Hazar Khan Khosoto take serious notice of theattack on the school in BaldiaTown.

MQM urgespolitical partiesto give tickets

to workersSTAFF REPORTER

KARACHI—The MuttahidaQaumi Movement Co-Ordi-nation Committee membersincluding Saleem Shahzad,Tariq Jawed, Syed Qasim AliRaza and Muhammad Ashfaqurged the leaders of politicaland religious parties, includ-ing the PMLN to award partytickets to their workers in-stead of their family mem-bers, friends, feudal lords andmoneyed people.

They said that workerswere the backbone of anypolitical party who give sac-rifices and face hardships.

They said that it was un-fortunate that political partiesignored their time-testedworkers.

Political and religiousparties should recognize theservices rendered by theirloyal workers and not ignorethem at the time of generalelections.

IGP for list ofpolicemen whoundertook elite,eaglet courses

KARACHI—The InspectorGeneral of Police (IGP), Sindh,Shahid Nadeem Baluch, hascalled for preparing lists ofthe police officials who hadundergone training throughthe elite and eaglet trainingcourses.

He was presiding over ameeting at the Central PoliceOffice (CPO) here on Fridaywhich reviewed the mattersand performance of theRapid Response Force. TheIGP directed that the remain-ing police commandosshould be included in theDIG/SSP reserve force so thatfor any immediate action sup-port could be provided to theThana/ District police.—APP

KARACHI—The CaretakerChief Minister of Sindh, Jus-tice (Rtd) Zahid KurbanAlavi, on Friday presided atCM House here a high levelmeeting regarding transitionarrangement in Local Gov-ernment Department.

The meeting was at-tended by Sindh Secretaryfor Local Government, AliAhmed Lund, Sindh Secre-tary Finance, Sohail Rajput,Principal Secretary to theCM, Naveed Kamran Baloch,Commissioner Karachi/Ad-ministrator KMC, Syed

Problems of Local Govt beresolved within 15 days: CM

Hashim Raza Zaidi, SindhSecretary Law, Syed GhulamNabi Shah, and others.

Caretaker Chief Ministerdirected the Commissioner/Administrator to makeKarachi a clean city and re-move all garbage from vari-ous localities, streets andtrade and commercial centresimmediately. He said thatKarachi is a cosmopolitancity, centre of business ac-tivities and providing jobs topeople coming here from vari-ous parts of the country.

Caretaker Chief Minister

further directed that public issuffering as such the pickingof garbage be immediatelystarted and sewerage dis-posal system be improved.He made it clear that he wantsKarachi city neat and cleanor else drastic action will betaken against negligent, care-less and violating persons.

Justice Zahid KurbanAlavi further directed Secre-tary Local Government toimplement similar action invarious towns, cities, UC’setc. through-out the prov-ince of Sindh.—APP

GreenwichUniversity gets

CSR AwardKARACHI—The GreenwichUniversity Karachi has re-ceived Corporate Social Re-sponsibility (CRS) Award2013 at the Fifth InternationalSummit on Corporate SocialResponsibility.

An official of the institu-tion said here on Saturdaythat the Award, initiated byNational Forum for Environ-ment and Health, was re-ceived by Assistant Profes-sor Tahira Khan, on behalf ofthe Vice Chancellor of Green-wich University, SeemaMoghul.

He pointed out that theGreenwich Universityreaches out to people at dif-ferent levels of societythrough its CSR activities.

The students are activelyinvolved in creating aware-ness about Polio eradication,Environment, CommunityDevelopment and fund rais-ing for organisations workingfor providing free medical fa-cilities to the poor and needy,it was further stated. —APP

KMC budgetKARACHI—KMC Adminis-trator Syed Hashim RazaZaidi has said that KMC andfive DMCs should completethe budget of next year byMay 15. He said this whileaddressing a meeting ofDeputy Commissioners, Mu-nicipal Commissioners andsenior officers, said a state-ment issued on Fridayevening.

The amount for salariesto DMCs was releasedtherefore employees’ sala-ries and pensions should bereleased immediately. TheKMC and DMCs shouldcomplete assessment oftheir assets, employees anddues of contractors in oneweek and the deductedamount for pension fromthe salaries of ZMC em-ployees should be providedto KMC.—APP

KARACHI—All PakistanMuslim League (APML) Cen-tral Information SecretaryAasia Ishaque said that Gen-eral (Retd) Pervez Musharrafreturned to Pakistan on hisown while the court did notask him to come back and ap-pear in the court. Musharrafappeared in the court just likea common man because herespected the Judiciary.

She said that the APML

Musharraf returned toPakistan on his own: APML

Chief Musharraf faced thePakistani Print and electronicmedia courageously and re-sponded to all allegations ina very diligent manner.

She said that Musharrafwas not like Tauqeer Sadiq,who had fled the country andthe government failed to com-ply to the orders of the apexcourt for bringing him back tothe country so that he couldbe produced before the apex

court to face the charges lev-ied against him regarding cor-ruption that amounted to bil-lions of rupees looted from thenational exchequer.

She said that contrary tothe apex court’s order for pro-ducing absconders likeTauqeer Sadiq, fabricated in-formation was being dissi-pated in the media for puttingMusharraf’s name in the exitcontrol list.—Online

COUNTRIES with lower mortality frominfectious disease exhibit higherrates of type 1 diabetes, according

to a new study by Dr. A. Abela and Profes-sor S. Fava of the University of Malta.

The findings, collating data from threemajor international studies and presentedat the Society for Endocri-nology annual conferencein Harrogate UK, suggestthat the as yet unexplainedglobal rise in type 1 diabe-tes may be linked to re-duced exposure to patho-gens in early life, The DailyMail reported. Type 1 dia-betes is caused when theimmune system destroysthe cells of the pancreasthat release insulin, leavingthe patient unable to con-trol his own blood sugar.

It is estimated to affectaround half a million chil-dren worldwide, increasingin incidence by an esti-mated 3% every year. Thisincrease is well docu-mented and is linked to the developedworld, but is so far unexplained varioustheories put forward include the ‘hygienehypothesis’, which suggests that encoun-ters between the developing immune sys-tem and micro-organisms such as bacteriaand parasites are part of human evolutionand may therefore protect against the de-velopment of auto-immunity. The research-ers investigated whether markers of infec-tious disease burden could be linked tothe local incidence of type 1 diabetes.They used data from the World HealthOrganisation (WHO) DiaMond Project,WHO global burden of disease: 2004 up-

Global Rise in type 1 diabetes may belinked to reduced exposure to pathogens

date, and the Alexander Project, to corre-late type 1 diabetes incidence by coun-try with mortality from infectious diseaseand bacterial antibiotic susceptibility(which indicates antibiotic use and thusexposure to bacterial infection).

Type 1 diabetes rates were highestin countries with low mor-tality from infectious dis-ease. This was true for totalmortality from infectiousdisease (r=-0.35, p=0.008), aswell as deaths caused spe-cifically by diarrhea, respi-ratory disease, tuberculosis,and infections and parasiticdisease (all p0.05).

They also found type1 diabetes rates are signifi-cantly associated with thelocal susceptibility of thebacteria Streptococcuspneumoniae to all antibiot-ics studied.

This study suggeststhat there may be an asso-ciation between type 1 dia-betes rates and infectiousdisease burden. It is possible

that the increasing global incidence of type1 diabetes may be linked to lack of expo-sure to pathogens during early life. Whilstthe data provide support for the hygienehypothesis they do not prove it: the risein type 1 diabetes rates is a complex prob-lems and this study is of association only.Other potential contributing factors mayshow a similar geographical variation toinfectious disease burden, as this is linkedto the developed world. The authors arekeen to use further studies to identify otherenvironmental factors which may predis-pose to type 1 diabetes.

LAHORE: Former Chief Minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif interviewing ladies for award of special seats tickets for PML-N.

LAHORE: Devotees performing religious obligations during the Mela CharaghanMadhoo Lal Hussain (RA).

SALIM AHMED

LAHORE—The GovernmentCollege University LahoreDramatics Club (GCUDC) Sat-urday staged its annual Urduplay ‘Shah-e-Alam’ which iscompletely a political satireand revolves around symbolicjourney of despotic ruler whois intoxicated by power andwine. Vice Chancellor Prof DrMuhammad Khaleeq-ur-Rahman was the chief guestat the opening show of theplay written and directed byGCUDC Advisor SameerAhmad. University of Educa-tion Vice Chancellor Prof DrFaiz-ul-Hassan, veteran actorFirdous Jamal, famous TV an-chor Noor-ul-Hassan and alarge number eminent OldRavians also witnessed themaiden show and applauded

the performance young univer-sity students.

Salman Bhatti, who hasserved previously as the presi-dent of the Dramatics Club,plays the lead role of King ShahMuhammad. The king’s fearsare highlighted through thejuxtaposition of three hallucina-tions: his conscience, Zameer,played by Umer Dar, ChangezKhan, played by Hamza Ishfaq,and the spirit of his late wifeShah Begum, played byGCUDC former presidentNayab Faiza.

While Zameer remindsShah Muhammad of the sacri-fices that the public has madefor the king’s pleasures, ShahBegum reminds him of thechoices he has made in orderto retain and expand his king-dom. Changez Khan, mean-while, urges the king to remain

a Machiavellian despot anddisregard the voice of his con-science. Add to this the char-acter of Shah Bano, the king’sdaughter played by MariamDogar, and the king faces amulti-dimensional conflict.

To add to the king’s woes,he is unaware of the con-spiracy being hatched in hiscourt. Waleed Hashmi,Zohaib Zafar, Hammad Sohailand Umer Shehzad as thecourtiers deliver powerful per-formances, and it is throughthem that occasional comicrelief is also provided in laterscenes. The play’s climax is apowerful and moving culmi-nation of the tension builtover successive scenes.GCUDC Adviser SameerAhmad says that the play in-terposes between dream andreality. To achieve the kind of

dramatic effect that this struc-ture necessitates, the con-tinuum of time and space ismanaged cleverly. Lights andSounds In-charge Saad Jamalhas created two time zones onone stage through the inno-vative use of lighting. Tocomplement this, the space onstage is managed throughpauses and breaks that shiftthe focus from the front of thestage to the back where theking is inebriated and on histhrone. This shift creates thekind of “wilful suspension ofdisbelief” that drama requiresfor its impact to register on theaudience.

Addressing the audienceafter the play, Vice Chancel-lor Prof Rahman announcedcash awards of Rs 100,000 forthe cast of the play for theirwonderful performance on

the stage. He also an-nounced cash award of Rs5,000 each for the technicalstaff of GCU who providedsupport to the DramaticsClub. He said that theatrehad an important functionto reform the society. He ap-preciated GCU DramaticsClub for introducing a newtrend of writing its ownplays and lauded the teamfor successfully staging itsfourth consecutive homeproduction.

Veteran actor FirdousJamal said that he wasthrilled by the efforts ofGCU Dramatics Club. Hesaid theatre can encouragesocial reforms and so it isimperative that universitytheatre groups pick upthemes which educate aswell as entertain.

GCU stages its annual Urdu play ‘Shah-e-Alam’

LAHORE: Government College University Lahore Dramatics Club students present-ing Urdu drama ‘Shah-e-Alam’.

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Caretaker ChiefMinister Punjab Najam Sethihas said that the tragic incidentof burning down houses ofChristian community in JosephColony Badami Bagh was anextremely regrettable act as noreligion allows such an inhu-man act. He said the barbaricincident was highly condem-nable and there is a need toadopt effective strategy to stoprecurrence of such incidents infuture. He said all segments ofthe society would have to playactive role in promotion of tol-erance, forbearance and peacein the society. He warned thatno such incident would be tol-erated in Punjab in future.

Caretaker Chief Ministerwas presiding over a high-levelmeeting about relief work be-ing carried out at JosephColony Badami Bagh held atChief Minister’s Secretariat,Saturday. The meeting was at-tended by Chief Secretary, Ad-vocate General Punjab, Secre-taries of Home, Law, Communi-cation & Works, IG Punjab, Ad-ditional IGs, Commissioner

Lahore Division, CCPO Lahore,DG LDA and other concernedauthorities.

Addressing the meetingNajam Sethi said that the imageof Pakistan at the internationallevel has been damaged as aresult of tragic incident at Jo-seph Colony Badami Bagh, andsuch regrettable incidents arenot tolerable at any cost. Hesaid promotion of inter religiousharmony was need of the hourfor which every individual inthe society would have to playhis effective role. He said theconstitution of Pakistan pro-vides complete protections ofrights to the minorities and theycan enjoy equal rights underthe law in Pakistan. Najam Sethisaid all citizens belonging to mi-norities living in Pakistan areequal in the eye of law, whileprotection of their life and prop-erty is the responsibility of thestate. He said that Christiancommunity has played an ef-fective role from establishmentof Pakistan to the process ofconstruction of Pakistan, whileChristian educational institu-tions are playing effective rolein promotion of education in

Pakistan. Caretaker Chief Min-ister Punjab Najam Sethi Satur-day called on Chief JusticeLahore High Court (LHC) UmarAta Bandial here on Saturday.In the meeting held in the LHC,Sethi and LHC Chief Justice

discussed upcoming generalelections besides other issues.

The caretaker chief minis-ter along with chief justice vis-ited various departments of thecourt. Registrar LHC was alsopresent on the occasion

CM meets LHC CJ

Sethi for restoration of Pak imageabroad by eliminating intolerance

LAHORE: Punjab Chief Minister Najam Sethi shakinghands with Chief Justice Lahore High Court Umar AtaBandial.

MUZAFFAR ALI

LAHORE—The three-dayannual urs celebrations ofone of the greatest PunjabiSufi poets, Hazrat ShahHussain, commonly knownas Madhu Lal Hussain beganat his shrine at Baghbanpuranear Shalimar Gardens onSaturday. Nearly half a mil-lion people from around thecountry are expected to at-tend the three-day event. Thedistrict administration hasannounced holiday on Sat-urday (today). The Urs ofMadhu Lal Hussain is cel-ebrated every year in Lahoreon Saturday and Sunday atthe end of March. Thou-

sands of devotees from ev-ery nook and corner of thecountry and abroadthronged the shrine of ShahHussain on the first day ofthe urs.

His poetry is full of sym-bolism. Some of his most fa-mous kafis feature theCharkha, as in those daysforeign merchants used tosell cotton to Lahore, whichthe poor later weaved intocloth. The illustrious son ofLahore, Shah Hussain, wasborn in 1538 to a convertweavers’ family. He is knownfor his love for a Brahminboy, Madhu or Madhu Lal,and they are often referred toas a single person with a

composite name of MadhuLal Hussain. Madhu’s gravelies next to Shah Hussain’sin the shrine. Shah Hussainis the pioneer of the Kaf,i aform of Punjabi poetry.

The whole area ofBaghbanpura and localitiesclose to it, buzz with differentcolourful activities and an at-mosphere of ecstasy and joyprevails. Dhol is played andpeople are seen dancing to itsbeats. Devotees light candlesfor the fulfilment of theirprayers and wishes. They alsodistribute charity food and milkand sharbat sabeels are alsoset up to facilitate the devo-tees. Floral wreaths are laid atthe graves of Shah Hussain.

Thousands throngshrine of Madho Shah

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Senior jurist andPakistan People’s Party (PPP)veteran Senator AitzazAhsan on Saturday said thatformer strongman PervezMusharraf should have beenarrested the moment helanded at the airport. He wasspeaking to media after sub-mitting nomination papers ofhis wife to the Punjab Elec-tion Commission.

Aitzaz advised those whohurled shoe at the former mili-tary ruler in Karachi not tocommit self-contempt by in-

dulging in such acts. The PPPleader said that Musharrafwould be held accountablefor Lal Masjid operation andassassinations of AkbarBugti and Benazir Bhutto.

Replying a query regard-ing Bilawal Bhutto Zardari,the Senator said nobodyever raised questions aboutMoonis Elahi and HamzaShahbaz. He expressed thehope that Punjab caretakerChief Minister Najam Sethiwould hold free and fair elec-tion.

Atizaz Ahsan said that hiswife Bushra Gohar was

awarded PPP ticket on meritand Benazir Bhutto alsowanted to see her in the Na-tional Assembly.

Meanwhile, Senior leaderof the Pakistan Muslim League– Nawaz (PML-N) said Satur-day that General (retd) PervezMusharraf is a national crimi-nal and hoped that the courtswould hold the former militaryruler accountable for all hiscrimes. Speaking to the mediarepresentatives about theformer military strongman’srecent return, Iqbal said the listof Musharraf’s crimes was along one.

Musharraf should have beenarrested at airport: Aitzaz

Justice dispensationsensitive priority:

Judge LHCSTAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Mr Justice ShNajamul Hassan senior judgeof Lahore High Court hassaid that prime duty of thejudges is to dispense justiceas per law of the land andconstitution without fear orill will. Hon’ble judge wasaddressing at the Punjab Ju-dicial Academy at the con-cluding ceremony of a capac-ity building course designedfor the civil judges.Justice(R) Khalilur RehmanKhan honorary consultantand officers of LHC were alsopresent on the occasion.

Justice Najam said thatdistrict judiciary enjoys apivotal role in the system ofjustice of the country. It isdire need that judicial offic-ers should discharge theironerous obligations with ut-most care and responsibility.He advised the judges torecord the evidence person-ally as statements made be-fore the trial court carry muchweight . Framing of chargemust be done after meetingdue procedure of law. Anyshort cut or procedural bottlenecks at the initial stage canspoil the case due to whichcriminals escape punish-ment, Justice Sheikh added.

He asked the judges tohave hands on informationtechnology. Every judgeshould be a computer liter-ate. Latest judgments of apexcourts, full of guidance, areavailable on internet whichhelp speedy resolution ofdisputes. Furthermore lawsites available on net are veryhelping, Justice Sh. con-cluded.

Chinesedelegation visitP&D, LUMS

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—A delegation ofChinese journalists which iscurrently on a tour to Lahore,visited Planning & Develop-ment Department where Dr.Naveed briefed the delega-tion about the working ofP&D Department. The del-egation was told that Punjabhas made significantprogress in education andhealth sectors during the lastdecade especially projectsaimed at public welfare andprovision of basic facilities inthe far flung districts havebeen completed on prioritybasis.

The Chinese delegationwas also appraised of theavailable resources in Punjab,population and administrativedivision of the province. Mem-bers of the delegation evincedkeen interest in the progressregarding computerization ofpatwar system, adopted sinceMughal regime. The Chinesedelegation also expressed itssatisfaction over the promo-tion of Chinese culture, lan-guage and its protection ofChinese people working inPakistan. The head of the del-egation, Prof. Zhoring said thatPakistan should fully benefitfrom the progressing Chineseeconomy.

Annoyed PML-Nworkers protest

STAFF REPORTER

LAHORE—Pakistan MuslimLeague-Nawaz (PML-N)workers from Lodhran stagedprotest demonstrations out-side party secretariat here onSaturday. The protest demowas held against distributionof party tickets to turncoats(Lotas). They also staged sit-in outside the secretariat.

During the protest twoannoyed party activistsclimbed up the electricity poleto register their protestagainst the injustice. Theprotesters also stopped thePML-N central leaderZulfiqar Khosa on the way.