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Posts published in October 2012

Legislators divided over levying of income tax in G-B

By Shabbir Mir  in The Express Tribune, Oct 31 GILGIT: While public representatives are divided over the imposition of income tax in Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B), the public has decried the move. “It will be unfair to tax the people of G-B,” said Mirza Hussain, a Pakistan Muslim League (Q) member of the G-B Legislative Assembly, reasoning that a majority of the people are poor and cannot afford to pay taxes. Hussain said that instead of imposing…

Kashmiris call for Scottish-model referendum

LONDON: British Kashmiris under the auspices of Kashmir Centre London organised a peaceful demonstration outside Indian High commission here. Such demonstrations were also held in Birmingham and Glasgow. The demonstrators were carrying banners like “Indian forces quit Kashmir” “Indian democracy shame”, “stop human rights violations in Kashmir,” “implement UN resolutions in Kashmir”, “our demand Freedom.” A memorandum was also handed over to the Indian High Commission for Prime Minister of India Manmohan Singh in this…

G-B, AJK set to have international airports

By Zahid Gishkori in The Express Tribune, Oct26 ISLAMABAD: President Asif Ali Zardari has directed the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) to carry out a study on constructing two new all-weather international airports in Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B) and Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK). “The president has directed CAA to carry out a study for the construction of the Chilas International Airport,” confirmed CAA spokesperson Pervez George on Thursday. He added that studies for constructing another international airport…

River Neelum in danger: edit in The Nation, Oct 25

Parliament’s Special Committee on Energy Crisis has called for a speedy completion of the Neelum Jhelum project in order to stop India from diverting the course of the river. This is one of those tributaries on which depends a large part of our agriculture and hence it is highly important that it keeps flowing free of interruption, as the Indus Waters Treaty stipulates. The entire belt along the river runs the risk of turning into…

Plan to monitor glaciers through remote sensors

LAHORE:  The Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) is developing a project for monitoring glaciers through remote sensors, which will be put before regional countries for approval. “After consulting all stakeholders and with the prior approval of the Government of Pakistan, the project will be put up in a meeting of the Abu Dhabi Group Dialogue scheduled for December in Bangkok,” said Wapda Chairman Raghib Shah. He was speaking during meeting with a World Bank…

Kishanganga arbitration: op-ed by S M Hali in the Nation, Oct 24

The writer is a political and defence analyst On October 27, 1947, the Indian forces occupied Kashmir, denying the Kashmiris the right of accession in accordance with the Independence Act of 1947. The illegal occupation resulted in the 1947-48 Kashmir war and later the 1965 and 1971 Pak-India wars. However, the accession of Kashmir remains unresolved. The method in the madness dawned on Pakistan much later. Kashmir happens to be the source of most of…

Govt allocates Rs13.7bn for Diamer-Basha dam project

LAHORE: The federal government has allocated Rs13.78 billion for the 4,500MW Diamer-Basha dam project during the fiscal year 2012-13, said chairman of Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA), while talking to Gilgit-Baltistan Works Minister Bashir Ahmed, Health Minister Haji Gulber Khan and Taxation and Minerals Minister Muhammad Naseer Khan, who called on him. The chairman said that as many as 14 local contracts had already been awarded and the construction work on WAPDA offices, colonies,…

AI in Kashmir: edit in the Nation, Oct 21

A team of Amnesty International on a visit to the Indian-occupied Valley met with Hurriyet leaders, including Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, and was informed about the ongoing atrocities. Whether it is Amnesty International, or anyone else, the best they can do to end this reign of terror is to raise their voice about the need to implement the relevant UNSC resolutions. Despite that attempt to erase these resolutions from collective memory,…

PTI delays G-B, AJK elections till next year

By Zahid Gishkori in The Express Tribune ISLAMABAD: With serious differences among the party leadership, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has decided to postpone intra-party elections for its Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B) and Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) chapters till next year. PTI leaders dealing with intra-party elections told The Express Tribune on Friday that the party will not be able to hold elections for its office-bearers in G-B and AJK till next year since the party’s constitution is…

Much awaited amendments to be introduced to AJK’s constitution

MIRPUR: Prime Minister of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) Chaudhary Abdul Majeed disclosed late on Saturday that much awaited amendments would soon be introduced in the  interim constitution of AJK in consultation with all political forces, retired judges, lawyers and other stakeholders. Addressing the annual session of Azad Jammu & Kashmir Supreme Court Bar Association in Muzaffarabad Saturday evening, the prime minister asserted that the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government in AJK respected the independence…

G-B electricity woes: Winter is coming, and outages are getting worse

GILGIT: With the duration of power outages gradually increasing, people in Gilgit fear that the coming winter might be as worse as the last one. Locals said they were facing around two hours of power outages a day, but with the start of October the loadshedding hours have doubled. “Power goes out for hours sometimes four times a day; if the situation is so bad in the early days of October, just imagine how bad…