KARACHI: Pakistanis are conducting around 5,000-7,000 illegal international transactions in dollar-denominations every day via Dubai, as tightening of regulations in property and money markets has boosted business at the parallel currency avenues. “The situation has created shortage of dollars in the open market and shot the greenback value for the time being,” said Malik Bostan, a currency dealer. He said that the Hawala/Hundi business {money transition through informal channels} is prohibited in Pakistan. However, Dubai…
Posts published in “Day: December 1, 2016”
ISLAMABAD: Shortfall in tax collection has further widened to over Rs130 billion in five months while the number of income tax return filers dipped by 38%, as tax machinery struggled to match even its last year’s performance. The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) provisionally collected Rs1.067 trillion during the July-November period of this fiscal year – registering just 1.7% growth over collection of the same period last fiscal year, according to FBR officials. In absolute…
ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Planning and Development on Wednesday told the National Assembly that 29.5 percent of the total population was living below the poverty line. In a written statement, it was mentioned that about 50.3 million people were earning only Rs 3,030 monthly, which is alarming for country’s per capita income. Ministry of Finance told the house that investments of $19.8 million from food department, $136 million from petrochemicals and $59 million from metal…
JHANG: Maulana Muhammad Ahmed Ludhianvi’s timely withdrawal from the PP-78 by-election appears to have paved the way for a potential electoral victory of Masroor Nawaz Jhangvi, an independent candidate, even as Sindh Deputy Speaker Syeda Shehla Raza arrived in Jhang to campaign for Pakistan Peoples Party candidate Sarfaraz Rabbani. Masroor Jhangvi, son of Sipah-i-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP) founder Haq Nawaz Jhangvi, has a sizeable vote bank of sympathisers in the Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat largely due…
The author is a connoisseur of music and literature. There are many law enforcement agencies in Pakistan but none inspires terror in the bosom of the ordinary citizen quite like the Punjab Police (hereinafter PP). A few years ago a close friend was elated to know that his then recently stolen laptop and some other stuff had been recovered from apprehended thieves. After one daunting meeting with the SHO however, he decided not to claim…
Incidents of crime, in particular street crime, have increased this year as compared to 2015 in Lahore. Official data shows that incidents of extortion, car snatching and kidnapping have increased in the 11 months of 2016. There were 507 murders in the full year of 2015 while in 2016 there are already 502 incidents – hardly an improvement.The Punjab government has spent an exorbitant amount of money on the Turkish inspired ‘Dolphin force’ that has…
MULTAN-About 40 percent colossal loss of water takes place in the century old watercourses because of their poor maintenance and aging across the Punjab province, an agriculture officer disclosed. The tertiary canal commanded irrigation system irrigates 37.46 million acres of land through about 58,000 watercourses in Punjab, said Naveed Asmat Kahloon, assistant director agricultural information while talking to The Nation. He said that this is resulting in severe shortage of irrigation supplies at the farm…
At least two explosions were heard in Kabul city earlier tonight amid reports two rockets landed in Shash Darak diplomatic area of the city. Security sources confirmed that the rockets landed between Pul-e-Mahmood Khan area and Shash Darak but no casualties have been reported so far. A security official in the Ministry of Interior confirmed that the rockets landed in the vicinity of Maslakh area in Shashdarak and the area has been cordoned off by…
A Taliban insurgent involved in rocket attack on Bagram airfield was arrested by the Afghan intelligence operatives. The Afghan intelligence, National Directorate of Security (NDS), said the suspect has been identified as Maruf son of Taj Mohammad and was involved in various terrorist activities including rocket attack on the largest US base in Bagram. NDS further added that Rauf is the brother of Mawlavi Bashir, the former shadow deputy governor of the Taliban for Parwan.…
The Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF) cleared the strategic Pacher Agam district of the loyalists of Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group. The provincial police commandment in a statement said at least 17 loyalists of the terror group were killed or wounded during the latest counter-terrorism operations. The statement further added that the dead bodies of numerous ISIS militants were left in the area and several weapons and ammunition belonging…
Karachi: The Afghan Taliban are facing a cash crisis with donors unwilling to bankroll an insurgency whose victims are increasingly civilians rather than foreign troops, according to several members of the movement. Mullah Rahmatullah Kakazada, a senior diplomat under the Taliban regime, told the Guardian that the Taliban was in an increasingly precarious financial position despite chalking up several dramatic battlefield successes in the last year. “The war is becoming unpopular because of all the…