e-paper pakistantoday 28th December, 2012

GARHI KHUDA BUKHSHStaff RepoRt

H is mother’s fifth anniversarywould always be remembered ashis coming of age; completingthe transition from youth to

manhood. Pakistan People’s PartyChairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari onThursday made his debut in the country’spolitics by making an emotional, and attimes charged, speech in Garhi KhudaBuksh, a few yards away from the grave ofhis mother, former PM Benazir Bhutto.

His speech was of extreme importance asit was the first time the PPP chairmanorated in national language, Urdu,connecting with millions of Pakistanis,especially PPP workers, alien to Englishlanguage, which Bilawal is fluent in.Addressing a massive public gathering,Bilawal said he was standing amongmartyrs and “my grandfather and mymother are with me today”.“Bhutto is not a name, it’s a mission,” hesaid. Bilawal said that blood of Benazirwas running in his veins and vowed thatthe PPP would never allow any dictator or

terrorists to snatch rights of the people orterrorise them. But he said politics was thename of love, not hatred.“Why are people afraid when ademocratically elected president entersthe Presidency?” he questioned, addingwhy did nobody see dictators like GeneralZia and General Musharraf. Praising hisfather, Bilawal said the country wouldsurely have an enlightened future “underthe leadership of President Asif AliZardari”. He said the party had laidfoundations of a system to provideemployment to every youth‚ educate every

child and ensure best possible medicalcare for every citizen. “The PPP broughtdemocracy to this country and it is fullycommitted to defend it. shaheed ZulfikarAli Bhutto and shaheed Benazir Bhuttolaid down their lives for the rights of thepeople and the party would never deviatefrom their mission, come what may.” ThePPP chairman said parliament wassovereign today and the power lay withthe people. Bilawal said the Benazirincome support Programme was fulfillingthe needs of the poor regarding education‚

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Friday, 28 December, 2012 Safar 14, 1434Rs 15.00 Vol III No 181 19 Pages Lahore Edition

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Friday, 28 December, 2012

Today’s

LookQuick

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INFoTaINMeNT

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pakistan in 2012: Between hope and despair erratic environment may be key to human evolution

Six injured in blast outside Charsadda mosqueA bomb exploded near a mosque located in Haji Abadarea of Umerzai, injuring six people on Thursday, a pri-vate TV channel reported. According to the police, thebomb was planted on outside the mosque. Hospitalsources said six people were wounded as a result of thebomb blast. MonItoRInG DeSK

Two security officials killed in Quetta QueTTa: Two intelligence agency officials were killedin satellite Town area of Quetta on Thursday. Accord-ing to police, armed men riding a motorcycle openedfire on four personnel of Mi on Zhob Road in satelliteTown. One of them succumbed to his injuries on thespot while another injured died on his way to a hospi-tal. The deceased were identified as ishaq and AbdulRehman. Deputy inspector General (investigationWing) Hamid shakeel confirmed the killing of two se-curity personnel and said that it was yet to be investi-gated whether they were on duty or on vacation. Policesaid that investigation into the incident was underwayhowever motive behind the incident was yet to be as-certained. separately, four people, including twowomen, were killed and another person sustained in-jures in a collision between a car and truck in LasbelaDistrict. According to details, a Bela-bound car comingfrom Karachi rammed into a truck coming from oppo-site direction near Gador Goth, some 600 kms southwest of Quetta. Two Hindu women, Hansa Devi andBoji Hera Lal, and car driver, Aslam Chana, were killedon the spot while Ramesh Kumar was injured. Bela po-lice rushed to the spot and shifted the bodies and theinjured to a nearby hospital. Police arrested the truckdriver and started investigation. Staff RepoRt

Shutter-down strike continuesagainst FC operationsQueTTa: shutter-down strike was observed in differ-ent parts of Makran division on the second consecutiveday on Thursday, against the alleged on-going searchoperations in Mashkay area of Awaran district by secu-rity forces. The strike was observed in Turbat, Mandand Tump area of Kechh district and Gwadar, Jeevaniand Pasni of Gwadar and Panjgur districts. All shopsand markets remained closed along with private andgovernment offices causing inconvenience to the people.Local administration took strict security measures toavert any untoward incident. similarly, activists ofBalochistan National Party-Awami (BNP-A) took out arally in Kalat town and staged a demonstration againstthe search operations. Protestors carrying placards andbanners paraded different roads of the city and laterculminated in a public gathering at Chowk of Kalat.Prominent BNP-A leaders including Aziz Mughal, sar-dar sidique Dehwar and member of Citizens ActionCommittee Mir Munir shahwani addressed the crowdand strongly condemned the alleged operations inMashkay by security forces. SHaHZaDa ZULfIQaR

SC to announce judgementin Reko Diq case on Jan 7ISLaMaBaD: A three-member bench of the supremeCourt, headed by Chief Justice of Pakistan iftikharChaudhry, will announce a short judgement in theReko Diq lease case on January 7, 2013. The supreme Court reserved its judgement on Decem-ber 21 after counsel of all petitioners and respondentscompleted their arguments. A number of identical petitions were filed in the courtagainst the lease of gold and copper mines in RekoDiq, Chaghi District, to the Tethyan Copper Company(TCC). Khalid Anwar, counsel for the TCC, defended the leasedeal reached between the company and the Balochis-tan government. The TCC also invoked the jurisdictionof the international Chambers for Commerce and in-ternational Centre for settlement of investment Dis-putes against the Government of Pakistan for notrenewing the prospective Reko Diq minerals licence inaccordance with Balochistan Mining Rules 2002. app

ISLAMABADtayyaB HUSSaIn

THE opposition partieson Thursday rejectedthe speeches made bythe PPP leadership onthe fifth death an-

niversary of PPP chairwoman Be-nazir Bhutto.

They said that hollow sloga-neering without any practical planover national issues were uselessand reflected that the rulersthought that they could further be-fool the people of Pakistan withemotional statements and refer-ences to their martyrs.

Talking to Pakistan Today,PML-N spokesman Asim Khansaid that the speeches by PresidentAsif Zardari and his son BilawalZardari had disappointed the peo-ple.

“since this was formal launch-ing of Bilawal, the nation was ex-pecting something concrete fromthe young man. However, since hisspeech had no mention to the mis-eries being faced by the masses, it

is proved that the young man hasno concerns with the people andthere is a total disconnect betweenthe UK-returned youngster andthe people of Pakistan,” he added.

He said it would have beenbetter if President Zardari or Bi-lawal had taken the nation intoconfidence about the killers of Be-nazir Bhutto.

PML-N secretary-informationMushahidullah Khan said that thepresident should have announceda date for elections rather than

making tall claims.Pakistan Tehreek-e-insaf (PTi)

secretary information shafqatMahmood said that it was the in-competence of the PPP govern-ment that was reflected in pastfour and half years which forcedthe PPP leadership to emotionallyblackmail the people taking pa-tronage of their assassinatedleader – Benazir Bhutto.

He said it was easy to make tallclaims, which both PresidentZardari and Bilawal Bhutto made

during their speeches at GarhiKhuda Bukhsh, but it was difficultto materialise the same.

“The claim by PresidentZardari that a consensus primeminister will be installed in a care-taker set up will remain unrealisedif all opposition parties are notconsulted,” he added.

He said that both the PML-Nand PPP had struck an underhanddeal on installing a caretaker setup that would help keep intact thestatus quo in the country. How-ever, he added, the PTi will opposesuch a deal between both the par-ties. He said by formally launchingBilawal Bhutto Zardari in practicalpolitics, the PPP had added a newchapter to the family control onpolitical parties.

He said it was useless to com-ment over Bilawal’s speech and thepoor child had learnt by heartsome traditional sentences, whichhe uttered in front of masses.

The PTi leader said it was use-less to pin hopes on a governmentthat had failed to apprehend thoseculprits who killed their leader.

GaRHI KHUDa BaKHSH: thousands of ppp workers

gather at Garhi Khuda Bakhsh on the death anniversary

of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto. ONLINE

Opposition rejects ‘hollow’claims by Zardari, his song PML-N spokesman says speeches by President Zardari and Bilawal have disappointed people

g PTI spokesman says it is easy to make tall claims, but difficult to materialise them

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eDIToRIaLfive years after Benazir:

CoMMeNT

articles on Page 10-11

And a misconstrued policy of reconciliation.

aziz-ud-Din ahmad says;Qadri’s irrational demands: Who wants the elections to be postponed?

tausif Kamal says;Prerequisites for Pakistan’s survival: On how we can make ourcountry a truly modern and progressive state.Basharat Hussain Qizilbash says;Dirty game before partition: The British supported Congress’united India over League’s Pakistan.

aRTS & eNTeRTaINMeNT

Story on Page 18

BuSINeSS

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SPoRTS

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Bollywood's brush with controversies in 2012 1,393 kg gold imported during five months of 2012-13 ‘Give iconic status to India-pakistan series’

LAHOREInp

MUTTAHiDA QaumiMovement (MQM)leader Farooq sat-tar on Thursdaylevelled allegations

of bias against Election Commission ofPakistan (ECP) secretary ishtiaqAhmed Khan and demanded that hebe removed from his position.

speaking to media representativesat the Allama iqbal international Air-

port in Lahore, the federal ministersaid the commission’s secretarywanted to alter MQM’s mandate inKarachi.

sattar demanded the ECP to con-duct an inquiry into what he calledbias on part of Khan and asked for hisremoval from the position. The minis-ter further said ideologies of MQMand of Dr Tahirul Qadri were similar,adding that, both wanted to abolishthe “outdated feudal system”.

He said Qadri and the MQM mayform an alliance in the future due to

their shared opposition to the feudalsystem, however, it was still to be dis-cussed as to how such a decisionwould be implemented.

sattar said the MQM had filed areview petition over the issue of delim-itation in Karachi, adding that theparty had requested the ECP to not gothrough with the process until thecourt decided on the review plea.

The MQM leader further said thatall stakeholders would be taken intoconfidence over the formation of acaretaker set up.

Production cost mustbe included in retailprice: aPCNGaISLaMaBaD: The All Pakistan CNG Association(APCNGA) has demanded the government to in-clude production cost in the retail price as per inter-national accounting laws.Ghayas Abdullah Paracha APCNGA supreme Coun-cil Chairman in a statement said the association re-quested the federal cabinet’s EconomicCoordination Committee (ECC) in its meeting onWednesday to account for all aspects, including op-erational cost and other expenses of CNG stationswhile finalising the new pricing formula. He saidthe urea sector was getting gas cheaper by Rs 44.04,independent power producers cheaper by Rs 23.42and the rest of the industry was given a discount ofRs 26.42 compared to CNG filling stations.Paracha said the government was charging Rs 14 asGiDC on every kilogramme of CNG sold in Potohar,Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Rs 9 inthe rest of the country, which should also be takeninto account before fixing prices.He added that the government was getting Rs 64.56from CNG stations in Region i, including Rs 57.02as gas price and Rs 7.54 as electricity bill, while Rs54.52 was being charged for the same in Region ii.Paracha said that the average cost of establishing aCNG filling station was Rs 51.8 million with averagesale of 54,868 kg per month which must be consid-ered while fixing prices.He urged the government to treat CNG stations atpar with gas companies to keep the business viable.He said the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority(OGRA) should determine CNG prices while keep-ing all these facts in mind. it will be unjustified ifthe price of gas and taxation imposed on CNG sta-tions are not brought at par with other sectors con-suming natural gas, he added. Law Minister FarooqH Naiksaid the CNG issue will be resolved soon inconsultation with all stakeholders. app

Pakistan against armsrace in South asia: Fo

ISLAMABADanWeR aBBaS

Foreign Office spokesman Moazzam Ahmad Khanon Thursday said Pakistan was against an arms racein the south Asia. Commenting on the recentlysigned arms deal between Russia and india, thespokesperson told journalists that anything whichcould initiate a nuclear or conventional arms racewould not augur well for the future of the region. Answering a question regarding granting indiaMost Favored Nation (MFN) status, Khan said thegovernment had decided in principle to grant theMFN status to india and were currently undergoinginternal processes which were expected to be com-pleted soon. The spokesperson said Pakistan con-sidered Kashmir a disputed territory and wascommitted for a just and peaceful resolution of thisissue in accordance with the UN resolutions and theaspirations of Kashmiri people. Regarding the rela-tionship between Pakistan and Us, Khan said wesaw ups and downs in our relations in 2012 but nowmost of these issues have been resolved. “Both countries want to strengthen their multifac-eted relations. The leadership of both countries hasmade it clear that peace and stability in Afghanistanis in their common interest,” he added.He said Pakistan had reiterated support for any ini-tiative that can result in an all inclusive political rec-onciliation led by the Afghans themselves. When questioned about the involvement of foreignnationals in Peshawar airport attack, thespokesman said terrorism and extremism were aparamount concern to Pakistan. “We are putting in all possible efforts to addressthis menace. Terrorism is a global phenomenon andwe are interacting with all countries to collectivelywipe out the threat posed by the menace. But i wantto make it clear that the Taliban did not request toopen an office in Pakistan,” he said.

KALABAGHInp

Pakistan Tehreek-e-insaf (PTi)Chairman imran Khan on Thursdaysaid funding for education andhealth would be his government’stop priority if he came to power. Heurged the youth to focus on educa-tion for no country could progresswithout it. “Muslims had been rulingthe world when they were leaders ineducation but they segregated intopieces the day they stopped educat-ing their children,” said Khan.

He made these remarks whileaddressing different public meetingsat Bangi Khel, Eissa Khel and adjoin-ing areas. PTi leaders inamullahNiazi, Ayla Malik and Nawab of Kal-abagh Malik Amir Mohammad Khanalso addressed the gatherings. Khantermed Asif Zardari and Nawazsharif as part of the same league say-ing they had been in power for thelast three decades but had done noth-ing for the welfare of the people of thecountry. “All they have achieved sofar is increase the miseries of the un-privileged,” said the PTi chief.

Khan said the Pakistan People’sParty (PPP) and PML-N had beentaking turns at ruling the country butnow their days were numbered be-cause they had been exposed in frontof the people of Pakistan.

“PTi’s tsunami will cleanse the

country from the corrupt and out-dated politicians in the next generalelections,” asserted Khan.

He said it was unfortunate thatlaws applied only to the poor in Pak-istan and the influential people re-mained above its grip. He vowed thatPTi would bring about a change inthe country by eliminating the pre-vailing unjust political system. Hesaid the politicians were not payingtaxes and were keeping their assetsabroad. severely criticising PunjabChief Minister shahbaz sharif forutilising all development funds of theprovince in Lahore and Raiwind,Khan accussed sharif of spending Rs72 billion over a single 22-kilometer-road, whereas he could have changedthe destiny of entire Mianwali withjust Rs 10 billion. “Afraid of the PTi’s

popularity in the younger genera-tion, sharif is distributing laptops towin their votes. i call upon the youthto get laptops which have been pur-chased through the national kitty butstill vote for PTi to get rid of thesecorrupt rulers,” he said.

Khan said most of the parlia-mentarians where illiterate and didnot even know how to write theirnames which was why the countrywas lagging behind in all spheres.

Khan said only the masses couldbring change through their voteswhen they vote for honest people inthe upcoming elections.

The PTi chief welcomed iqbalKhatak and Makhdoom of Balotsharif syed Murtajiz shah along withthousands of his followers into theranks of PTi.

WASHINGTONSpeCIaL CoRReSponDent

The United states (Us) will spendabout $5.7 billion over the next coupleof years to withdraw most of its troopsand equipment from Afghanistan, ac-cording to a new report by the Govern-ment Accountability Office (GAO).

An opinion piece in The Washing-ton Post Thursday revealed the Us hasspent nearly $600 billion over the past10 years putting combat forces intoAfghanistan.

“The size of the withdrawal ismind-boggling. But with the “fiscalcliff” approaching fast, it’s worth tak-ing a moment to realise that the costlyAfghan operation is going on a creditcard, along with the $1 trillion or morespent in iraq,” Walter Pincus said.

Analysing the high cost of disen-gagement, Pincus said iraq andAfghanistan were the first Us wars in

which the American public was notasked to pay a cent in additional taxes.

A unique Afghan issue is supplyroutes, because of what the GAO de-scribed as the “complex geopoliticalenvironment in the region.”

According to Pincus,the once-majorA f g h a nsupplyroutes

throughPakistan,which werereopened inJuly, are con-sidered to be in atest phase for materiel exitingAfghanistan.

Meanwhile, the Defense Depart-ment “faces challenges converting the

northern routes to support outboundflow due to customs and diplomaticclearance issues,” said GAO.

Under early plans, the Us Trans-portation Command projected that

“14.2 percent of all returningequipment willbe transportedvia the north-

e r nr o u t e ,19.9 per-cent viathe Pak-i s t a nr o u t eand 65.8

percent viathe air and

sea transportmethod.”

Landlocked Afghanistan also hashad high-priority military equipment,including ammunition, shipped in by

sea and then by air. it can cost up to$75,000 to return one vehicle by mili-tary air and sea transport and up to$153,000 using commercial carriers,according to the GAO. sending a vehi-cle by surface routes can cost up to$43,000.

Pincus noted that Congress andPresident Barack Obama were negoti-ating over increasing revenue and cut-ting spending, but the billions inAfghan withdrawal costs cannot be re-duced and must be paid. Their pay-ment will be considered next monthwhen Congress faces an increase to thedebt limit.

The Defense Department, mean-while, estimates that the military serv-ices have more than 750,000 majoritems worth more than $36 billion inAfghanistan including about 50,000vehicles and more than 90,000 ship-ping containers of materiel, accordingto the GAO report.

‘ECP secretary biased, should be removed’

Education, health will be PTI govt’s top priority: Imran

US to spend $5.7b on Afghan drawdown, Pakistan to be important route

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04

ECC to decide on ‘BusinessExpress’ by next week

ISLAMABADanWeR aBBaS

Economic Coordination Council (ECC) is likelyto resolve the issue of Rs 290 million liabilitiesby Pak-Business Express (PBE) towards Pak-istan Railways for using the national carrier’sinfrastructure and networks for operating itstrains, by the start of January 2013, Pakistantoday learnt through reliable sources. Accord-ing to sources, the decision of the ECC is ex-pected to bring some life into Pakistan Railwayswhich is facing a severe financial crisis. The PBEis liable to pay Pakistan Railways an estimatedamount of Rs 3.1 million daily on account ofusing their services and infrastructure, whereasits management has defaulted on several occa-sions, expressing lower than optimum capacityrate as their major reason. in October 2012,Pakistan Railways General Manager Opera-tions Junaid Qureshi issued a notice of forceddiscontinuation of PBE operations until the li-abilities were settled. The case was later referredto the ECC. The outsourcing of Night Coach toshalimar Group, initially for five years on a bidof Rs 631.95m with investment of Rs 81.838 min account of Value Added services and Rs1.731m for each train journey, will also prove amajor financial support for Pakistan Railways,as an advanced deposit of Rs 100 m for the re-pair of locomotives would be made.

Gohar Ayub and son join PML-NLaHORe: Former National Assemblyspeaker Gohar Ayub Khan on Thursdayrejoined the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). The announcement wasmade in a meeting with PML-N leaderNawaz sharif in Raiwind. The formerspeaker’s son Umar Ayub also joined theparty along with several supporters.Talking to reporters, Gohar Ayub said thatthe PML-N was very popular in their areaand they would try their utmost to gainsuccess for PML-N from Hazara Division.He said further that he also held talks onthe issue of Hazara province with the PML-N president and Nawaz had assured him ofcomplete support for the formation of theprovince. Earlier, Nawaz said in themeeting with Gohar Ayub and Umar Ayubthat there is unprecedented despair amongthe people about the future of the countrydue to policies of the government. He saidpeople were joining the PML-N due to itspeople-friendly policies. The PML-N chiefclaimed that the party would clean sweepthe forthcoming general elections in allprovinces. He said the N-League was theonly party which could rid the people ofcrises. Nawaz said timely elections wereinevitable for the solidarity and existenceof the country. Inp

MOSCOW aGenCIeS

RUssiAN PresidentVladimir Putin onThursday said hesaw no reason not

to sign a bill into law thatwould ban Americans adopt-ing Russian children andpromised measures to im-prove care of his country’s or-phaned youngsters.

Although Putin said hewould need to study the finaltext of the bill, the commentswere the strongest indicationyet that he will approve theadoption ban legislation,which has strained Us-Russiarelations. Parliament gave itsfinal approval on Wednesdayto the bill that would alsobring in other measures in re-taliation for new Us legisla-tion designed to punishRussians accused of humanrights violations.

“so far i see no reason notto sign it, although i have toreview the final text and

weigh everything,” Putin saidin televised remarks at ameeting of senior federal andregional officials.

“i am ready to sign notonly the law ... but also a pres-idential decree that will mod-ify the support mechanismsfor orphaned children ... espe-cially those who are in a diffi-cult situation, by that i meanin poor health,” Putin said.Critics of the bill say Russia isplaying politics with the livesof children. Child rights advo-cates say children in Russia’scrowded and troubled or-phanage system will have lessof a chance of finding homesif the bill becomes law.

Putin suggests he willsign US adoption ban

THE MANWHO WOULDBE KING

training and health,pointing out that the PPPgovernment facedenormous challenges dueto global recession andterrorism, but the economyhad been made to standfirmly on its feet.He said the PPP sought anapology from the people ofBalochistan, asking thepeople of Balochistan toreject the negative mindset.The PPP chairman said theparty believed in anindependent judiciary andhad accepted all itsverdicts.He asked the supremeCourt to decide thepresidential reference inthe Bhutto case at theearliest and bring theculprits to book.Bilawal questioned thejudiciary ignoring PPP’scases in favour of othercases and said, “We wantjustice from courts”.

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LAHOREStaff RepoRt

PUNJAB Chief Ministershahbaz sharif onThursday said the fu-ture of the country wasdependent on the up-

coming general elections.Talking to assembly members

from various districts, he said he wasconfident that Pakistan MuslimLeague–Nawaz (PML-N) would bevoted into office once again by thepeople who had had enough of cor-rupt regimes.

He further said President Asif AliZardari and his cronies had broken allrecords of corruption in the country,adding that under the dynamic lead-ership of Nawaz sharif, every penny

looted by the current leadershipwould be returned to the people.

The chief minister said it wasvery unfortunate that Pakistan pos-sessed nuclear capabilities in onehand and a beggar’s bowl in theother. Moreover, shahbaz said thatthe current electricity and gas crisesin the country had left thousands ofworkers jobless and forced them tolive in poverty.

The chief minister alleged that thePPP government had struck a deadlyblow to Punjab’s economy by sus-pending electricity and gas supply tothe province. He said that in order tomake Pakistan a self-reliant country,PML-N would move to restore powersupply as soon as possible, if electedin the next elections.

The chief minister was also of the

view that the taxpayer’s money,which had been lost due to corrup-tion, could have been used to buildhundreds of schools, hospitals androads across the country.

shahbaz said the PML-N wouldspare no effort for the elimination ofcorruption adding that PML-N’s cur-rent government in Punjab had alreadyundertaken various development proj-ects in a transparent manner.

shahbaz said educational scholar-ships were being given to 40,000 tal-ented students through the PunjabEducational Endowment Fund. More-over, thousands of laptops had beendistributed among students as a re-ward for their hard work.

He said the Punjab governmentof PML-N had served the masseswith honesty and commitment and

that was why people were looking to-wards PML-N for a serious change inthe status quo.

The CM said after Lahore, solidWaste Management and Metro Busservice projects would be initiated infive other cities of the province. Hefurther said the Metro Bus projectwas in the final stages of completionand would result in availability of in-ternational-standard traveling facili-ties to the common man. He saidmetro bus was not merely a projectbut a mission and was being com-pleted expeditiously.

The CM claimed that the people ofthe country were fully aware of whowas looting the national wealth andwho was serving the masses.

shahbaz added that the victory ofthe PML-N in the by-elections hadproved its popularity among themasses and all surveys were pointingto people’s support of PML-N.

Monitoring Desk

internet sensation One Pound Fish Man returned to ahero’s welcome in Lahore on Thursday.Hundreds showed up at Lahore airport to honourMuhammad shahid Nazir, who scaled the Britishmusic charts with “One Pound Fish”, which he origi-nally composed to entice shoppers at the east Londonmarket where he worked.Upon his arrival, Nazir said he would be visiting France intwo weeks and had returned to Pakistan to obtain his visa.The song became a YouTube hit after someone filmedNazir singing it at the market and Warner Music signedhim up for a record deal in the hope of getting the covetedChristmas number one spot in the charts.Nazir said the song came to him in a flash after his bossasked him to do something to encourage customers tocough up a pound ($1.60) for a fish.“This song is gift of God to me, i just sang it on the spot,”the father-of-four told reporters at the airport.Around 250 people including local politicians met him atthe airport, showering him with rose petals and chanting“Long live One Pound Fish”.

Future of Pakistan dependant onupcoming polls, says ShahbaznCM says President Zardari, his cronies broke all records of corruption

CNG stations to remain shut even today

LAHORE

Inp

Closure of CNG stations for the fourthconsecutive day on Thursday invitedthe anger of motorists and commutersof the city. According to sui Northern Gas PipelinesLimited (sNGPL) Managing DirectorArif Hameed, CNG stations in Lahore,Multan, sahiwal and sheikhupura wereclosed for another day due to low gaspressure and to ensure supply for thedomestic consumers.The supply to the CNG stations was ex-pected to resume on Thursday after athree-day closure but low pressure com-pelled the utility company to cut thesupply for another day. CNG supply wasexpected to resume today (Friday).However, sNGPL announced late Thurs-day evening that CNG supply would re-main closed on Friday as well. Citizens complained that CNG closurefor another day had been a source ofgreat inconvenience. They said that CNGwas a relatively cheap source of fuel fortheir vehicles, adding that the extendedclosure of CNG gas had forced them topurchase alternative sources of fuelwhich was much more expensive.

LAHOREapp

Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Punjabchapter on Thursday held a memorial serv-ice for Benazir Bhutto on her fifth deathanniversary. Allama Muhammad YousafAwan offered prayers for the deceasedleader at PPP Punjab office. PPP workersreiterated their commitment to continuethe mission of Benazir Bhutto who had losther life in her struggle for democracy andfreedom. A large number of PPP workersand leaders, including Hasnat shah, AltafQuershi, iqbal sialvi, Manzoor and otherswere present on the occasion.

LaHORe: Provincial Minister for LawRana sanaullah on Thursday actionwould be taken against Dr Tahirul Qadrifor his vehicles bearing fake numberplates. He further said that he was readyto give in writing that Qadri would nothold a long march. Talking to reportersoutside the Punjab Assembly, he saidthat the fate of long march of Tahir-ul-Qadri would not be different from thesit-ins of imran Khan against drone at-tacks. He said that a person traveling bythree bullet proof vehicles with fakenumber plates would never take out along march. He further claimed that thereturn Tahirul-Qadri was a stunt by es-tablishment against Pakistan MuslimLeague-Nawaz (PML-N), adding that theestablishment would not be able to de-ceive the people in the presence ofstrong media, independent judiciary andelection commission.

He said that the main target of estab-lishment was Nawaz sharif and PML-Nand it would use every trick up its sleeveto divide the party’s votes. Staff RepoRt

Benazir remembered

Qadri’s showdown asham, says Sanaullah

Have a, have a look!

fish Man To Take song To france

Photo by Murtaza Ali

The long arms of law forced

to push their own burden

on The Mall on Thursday. NNI

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SHARP organises seminaron human rights

JI condolesdeath of ProfGhafoorAhmed

LAHOREapp

Jamaat-e-islami (Ji)Punjab on Thursdayexpressed grief overthe demise of Jileader ProfessorGhafoor Ahmed.in a condolence mes-sage, Ji secretaryGeneral Nazir Janjuasaid the country hadlost a seasoned polit i-cian. He also prayed for thesoul of the deceasedand hoped that thegrieving family wouldhave patience to bearwith the loss.

CTO inspectsdiversionroutes

LAHOREapp

Chief Traffic Officersuhail Chaudhry onThursday inspected var-ious diversion pointsfor traffic and directedofficers to increase de-ployment of wardens toavoid traffic jams inrush hours.He also issued direc-tions to the City TrafficHelpline1915 and FMradios to provide guid-ance to the public aboutalternate routes. The CTO urged peopleto seek informationfrom traffic helpline1915 and traffic radiobefore leaving theirhomes.

LAHOREStaff RepoRt

SOCiETY for Human Rights and Pris-oners Aid (sHARP) on Thursday or-ganised a one-day training workshopfor capacity building of police officialsin police training schools on titled

Human and Refugee Rights in the Context of Rel-evant Laws and Notifications.

The workshop was inaugurated by sHARPField Manager sher Afgan with a welcome notewhere he said that the NGO was working for thebenefit and welfare of the needy and vulnerablecommunity in the society.

He stressed on the need for implementationof laws for human and refugee rights.

imrana Hasham presented the introductionof sHARP and said that the organization wasstriving for reforms in legislations for human and

refugee rights since 1999.NsPP Director Mohammad Afzal Khial shed

light on the fundamental rights conferred by Pak-istan’s Constitution of 1973. He told the gather-ing that these rights were bestowed without anydiscrimination of color, creed and religion.

UNHCR representative ihsanullah Khan gavea detailed account on the role of United Nationsfor protection of refugee rights and informed theparticipants about the international refugee law.

Photo by Murtaza Ali

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07Lahore

LAHOREStaff RepoRt

SENiOR Advisor to Punjab Chief Min-ister Zulfiqar Khosa on Thursday saidthat the provincial government wasstrictly following the policies of goodgovernance and austerity.

Addressing the 33rd meeting of Austerity Com-mittee, he said that administrative secretariesand heads of institutions should send recom-mendations of only genuine requirements to theAusterity Committee.

The meeting granted approval to the pur-chase of new vehicles and other equipment forsetting up Board of intermediate and secondaryEducation in sahiwal. The meeting also gave ap-proval to provision of 20 computers, LCDs, print-ers and scanners for information technology toGovernment College Jaranwala Faisalabad.

similarly, approval was also given for sevencomputers, seven LCDs, laser printer, scanner

and fax machine for Government Degree Collegefor Women Lalian District Chiniot.

The Austerity Committee gave approval for14 computers, LCDs, laser printers for Board ofintermediate and secondary Education DGKhan, as well as eight laptops for position holderstudents and other equipments.

Khosa also granted an approval for the pur-chase of furniture and other equipments for Gov-ernment Degree College for Women Haroonabadand the newly constructed hostel of governmentRiD College Haroonabad District Bahawalnagar.

similarly approval was granted for a sum ofRs 3.0445 million for the establishment of infor-mation Technology Department at GovernmentEmerson College Multan and a sum of Rs 2.850million for the provision of missing facilities atGovernment PG College Bosan Road Multan wasalso approved.

Khosa also permitted purchase of two newvehicles at a cost of Rs 4 million for the replace-ment of two old vehicles for the Board of inter-

mediate and secondary Education Lahore. Approval was also granted by the committee

for the purchase of equipment for GovernmentGirls Degree College Noshera Road Gujranwala,Government Girls Degree College Wazirabad,Government Boys Degree College Gujranwala,Government Degree College for Women Tal-vandi Bhindran, Narowal, Government DegreeCollege for Women Zafarwal, Narowal and Gov-ernment College for Women Dinga Tehsil Khar-ian. The meeting also granted approval for a newToyota Corolla GLi, one Toyota Hiace van, twosuzuki Cultus and other equipment for Board ofintermediate and secondary Education Gujran-wala. The committee also allowed Managementand Professional Development Department topurchase a Corolla vehicle.

senior Advisor sardar Zulfiqar Ali KhanKhosa stressed upon the officers that the auctionof old vehicles against which the purchase of newvehicles has been allowed be ensured with 90days otherwise action would be taken.

Provincial government followingpolicies of good governance: Khosa

GoLDDIGGeRS: Gypsy children wade through the canal in search of valuables. INP

MONITORING DESK

The Federal investigation Agency (FiA) passportcircle raided and arrested 11 Afghan citizensfrom the passport office in Garden Town onThursday. Per details, the Afghan were attempt-ing to obtain fake passports in connivance withthe help of agents, Liaquat Ali Bhatti and Aman-ullah.

They sources said the Afghans had paid a cu-mulative bribe of Rs 170,000 to obtain theforged documents.

An FiA assistant director commenting on theraid said the staff and officials were found to befacilitating such acts, adding that fake PakistaniComputerized National identity Cards (CNiC)were also confiscated from the arrested Afghanswho entered Pakistan two weeks ago.

Meanwhile, robbers escaped after looting Rs2 million in cash and gold from a house situatedin Gulberg. Per details, five robbers broke intothe house, took hostage the security guard onduty and escaped after looting.

similarly, robbers broke into the house ofiqbal shah, a resident of DHA P block, held iqbaland his family hostage at gun point and escapedwith 15 tolas of gold.

Afghans seeking fake passports arrested

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08


News

Nicaragua volcano sparksevacuation ordersManagua: Nicaragua's tallest volcano has belched anash cloud hundreds of metres into the sky prompting theauthorities to order the evacuation of some 300 families,the government said. san Cristobal, one of Nicaragua'sseven active volcanoes, also spewed hot gas and ash onTuesday in what is the latest bout of sporadic activity. Ayellow alert was declared on Wednesday in a 1.8-mileradius around the volcano to allow the evacuation ofresidents who would be at great risk during a significanteruption, Rosario Murillo, the federal governmentspokeswoman and first lady, told a local radio station.Murillo said 15 eruptions had been recorded over the lastday at the volcano northeast of Managua, Nicaragua'scapital. san Cristobal, believed to have erupted for the firsttime in 1685, has emitted regular small eruptions, butlarger ones are unpredictable, said Murillo. aGenCIeS

Syrian military policechief defects to rebelsDaMaSCuS: The head of syria’s military police hasdefected from President Bashar al-Assad's government andaccused the army of having turned into "murderous gangs",according to a security source in an online video. in thevideo circulated by opposition activists on Wednesday, themilitary-clad officer said: "i, General Abdel Aziz Jassem al-shallal, commander of syrian military police, announcethat i am defecting from the regime army, to join thepeople's revolution." "The army has deviated from itsessential mission, which is to protect the country, and ithas morphed into murderous, destructive gangs," shallalcharged in the video published on the internet video-sharing website YouTube. aGenCIeS

Seven dead in US as stormsnarls post-Christmas travelCHICagO: A massive Christmas storm that whipped uptornadoes, ice and snow from the Gulf of Mexico to theGreat Lakes has killed at least seven people and groundedmore than 2,000 flights. The storm snarled holiday travelas people were warned to stay home rather than brave thestrong winds, freezing temperatures and treacherousroads. The National Weather service warned of“dangerous travel conditions due to snow and ice coveredroads” and said the weight of ice and snow could knockdown power lines and trees. Already, more than 200,000people were in the dark. The weather service forecast upto 18 inches of snow from New York state up to Maine andwarned of freezing rain, tornadoes and severethunderstorms all the way down to the Carolinas. Areas inthe Rocky Mountains were also set to get about a foot ofsnow from a second storm system on Wednesday. aGenCIeS

BAGHDADaGenCIeS

TENs of thousands of sunniMuslims blocked iraq'smain trade route to neigh-bouring syria and Jordanin a fourth day of demon-

strations against shia Prime MinisterNouri al-Maliki.

The massive show of force onWednesday marks an escalation inprotests that erupted last week aftertroops detained the bodyguards ofsunni Finance Minister Rafia al-issawi,threatening to plunge iraq deeper intopolitical turmoil. "The people want tobring down the regime," chanted thou-sands of protesters in the sunni strong-

hold of Anbar province.it was the fourth major protest in less

than a week in an area, which was oncethe heart of the deadly sunni insurgencythat erupted after the Us -led invasion in2003. "This sit-in will remain open-ended until the demonstrators' demandsare met, and until the injustice againstends," cleric Hamid al-issawi told TheAssociated Press at the protest.

He accused Maliki of trying to createrifts among sunni and shia populations.

"These practices are aimed at draw-ing the country into a sectarian conflictagain by creating crisis and targetingprominent national figures," the clericsaid. in an exclusive interview with AlJazeera in Doha on Monday, exiled VicePresident Tareq al-Hashimi leveled

similar accusations against the Malikigovernment.

"On the ground, al-Maliki in fact, ona daily basis [is governing in a] sectarianway," Hashimi said. "We don't have anyoption but to advocate and defend our-selves," he said in justifying the ongoingprotests by sunni-backed groups.

Hashimi is now living in exile inTurkey after being handed multiple deathsentences for allegedly running deathsquads, a charge he dismisses as politi-cally motivated. The case is exacerbatingtensions with iraq's sunnis, who see thedetentions as politically motivated.

Earlier in the week, demonstratorsgathered along a highway linking Bagh-dad with neighbouring Jordan and syria.

They held banners demanding that

sunnis' rights be respected and callingfor the release of sunni prisoners iniraqi jails. "We warn the governmentnot to draw the country into sectarianconflict," read one. Another declared:"We are not a minority.''

iraq's majority shia rose to power fol-lowing the 2003 Us -led invasion thatousted saddam Hussein's sunni-domi-nated government, although the coun-try's minority sunni Arabs and Kurds dohold some posts within the government.

Maliki has defended the arrests of thefinance minister's guards as legal andbased on warrants issued by judicial au-thorities. He also recently warned againsta return to sectarian strife in criticisingthe responses of prominent sunni offi-cials to the detentions.

in a recent statement, the prime min-ister dismissed the rhetoric as politicalposturing ahead of provincial electionsscheduled for April and warned his oppo-nents not to forget the dark days of sec-tarian fighting "when we used to collectbodies and chopped heads from thestreets". The political tensions are risingat a sensitive time. iraq's ailing PresidentJalal Talabani is incapacitated followinga serious stroke last week and is beingtreated in a German hospital.

The 79-year-old president, an ethnicKurd, is widely seen as a unifying figurewith the clout to mediate among thecountry's ethnic and sectarian groups.

The discontent, however, extends be-yond sectarian lines, according to iraqipolitical analyst sabah al-Mukhtar.

JIanGSU: Chinese paramilitary policemen take part in winter training on Wednesday. AgENcIEs

NEW DELHIaGenCIeS

An indian student who was left in acritical condition after being brutallygang raped on a bus in New Delhi hasarrived in singapore for treatment at aleading hospital.

The 23-year-old student was airliftedto singapore on Thursday and immedi-ately admitted to the Mount Elizabethhospital, known widely for multi-organtransplant facilities.

The hospital said in a statement thatshe was admitted to the intensive careunit "in an extremely critical condition."

it said "she is being examined and thehospital is working with the indian High

Commission (embassy)."Press Trust of india quoted New

Delhi hospital medical superintendent,BD Athani, as saying on Wednesday nightthat the woman suffered severe intestinaland abdominal injuries.

she underwent three surgeries andparts of her intestines were removed, hesaid. He said the indian government,"based on the advice of a team of doc-tors,'' made arrangements for her to beshifted to singapore's Mount Elizabethhospital because it has state of the artmulti-organ transplant facilities.

Organisers said they wanted to de-politicise the protests and announcedthat they would march from the desig-nated protest area to Delhi Gate, which

has been cordoned off, effectively defy-ing government orders, our correspon-dent reported.

The indian government on Wednes-day ordered a special inquiry into thegang-rape of the student which hasdrawn mass outrage in india. FinanceMinister P Chidambaram, who is also thegovernment's top spokesman, said a re-tired judge, Usha Mehra, had agreed tohead a commission of inquiry. The in-quiry would "identify the lapses if any onthe part of the police, or another author-ity or person that contributed to the oc-currence, and fix responsibility for thelapses or negligence", he said.

Chidambaram also said a separatepanel would examine existing legislation

and "suggest changes in the laws in orderto make punishment for such horrificcrimes stiffer".

The panel will submit its report in 30days, he added. "Whatever we do now isintended to demonstrate the govern-ment's serious intent in the matter thatwe will apprehend and punish the perpe-trators, we will try and find out what wentwrong... and fix responsibility and amendthe laws." The gang-rape has sparkedhuge protests across the country, includ-ing New Delhi where thousands, mainlystudents and youth, gathered in front ofthe presidential palace demanding swiftaction from the government.

The government has been criticisedfor using force against the mostly student

protesters many of whom were severelyinjured. About 200 people took part in anew demonstration on Wednesday on aboulevard in central Delhi - includingwomen and school children - where theyshouted anti-government slogans.

The government's decision comesamid huge controversy over the death ofa police constable who died after he col-lapsed during the protest at india Gatemonument. Eight people have beencharged in connection with the death ofthe policeman, but civil society groupssay the constable died of heart attackeven as post-mortem report is yet to beout. The 47-year-old police constable,subash Tomar, was cremated with fullstate honours on Wednesday.

Protesting Sunnis block trade routes in Iraq

CAIROaGenCIeS

Egypt's President Mohamed Morsi has urged all po-litical powers to take part in a national dialogue toresolve lingering tensions and promised to take nec-essary steps to heal the economy.

At his first address to the nation since the adop-tion of a new constitution, he said on Wednesdaythat he was considering possible cabinet changesand planned to introduce incentives to make Egypta more attractive investment destination.

"The coming days will witness, God willing, thelaunch of new projects ... and a package of incen-tives for investors to support the Egyptian marketand the economy," he said in a televised speech.

Morsi spoke after Egypt's upper house of par-liament convened in its first session after the pass-ing of the country's new constitution, the first actionby a state institution in accordance with a documentwhose legitimacy is still contested by the opposi-tion. The shura Council held a swearing-in sessionfor 90 new members appointed by Morsi.

The charter, approved by 63.8 percent in a two-round referendum that ended on saturday, gives thetraditionally toothless upper house full legislativepowers until elections for a new lower house is calledwithin two months. The upper house of parliamenthas taken over from Morsi, who had given himself thepower to pass laws that led to days of violent protests.Morsi signed a decree enforcing the charter late onTuesday after the official announcement of the resultof a referendum approving the basic law, Egypt's firstconstitution since the toppling of former PresidentHosni Mubarak's overthrow. The president is ex-pected to address the shura Council on saturday.

The islamist-dominated council is expected to drafta law regulating upcoming parliamentary elections.Other items on the agenda may include laws on protestsand the media. The opposition National salvation Front(NsF) claimed the constitutional process was rushedand the referendum marked by irregularities. The NsF'sleader, Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace laureate andformer chief of the UN atomic energy agency, said thenew charter should be treated as an "interim one" untilanother is written up on the basis of consensus.

morsi aDmits mistakesanD urges unity

Indian gang-rape victim moved to Singapore

Indian tea workersburn boss to deathin Assam CaLCuTTa: Hundreds of teaplantation workers have set alight theirboss's bungalow in north-east india,burning to death the owner and hiswife, officials say. Angry workerssurrounded the bungalow atKunapathar in Assam state late onWednesday, following a two-week longdispute with the management. Policesaid the incident happened after themanagement asked some workers toleave their accommodation. More thanhalf of india's tea output comes from800 tea estates in Assam. Local officialss Meenakshi sundaram said some700 tea garden workers surroundedthe manager's bungalow on Wednesdayevening and set it on fire. Two vehiclesbelonging to the manager were alsotorched. The charred bodies of MridulKumar Bhattacharyya and his wife,Rita, were later recovered from thedebris, Mr sundaram said. aGenCIeS

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09


News

SRInaGaR: Kashmiri Sikh students shout slogans and hold placards as they take part in a protest in Srinagar on thursday, following the rape of a student in the Indian capital on December 16. ONLINE

NEWS DESK

Despite gradual improvements in relationswith the Us and india, terrorism, lawless-ness, human rights abuses and multiplepolitical crises hampered Pakistan’sprogress in the year 2012.

The year 2012 was not very differentfor Pakistan than the previous years as thecountry’s progress continued to be plaguedby terrorism and a non-functional econ-omy. Terrorist attacks were mostly perpe-trated by the Pakistani Taliban on civiliansand security forces but there was also anincrease in targeted killings of political andhuman rights activists, particularly in thesouthern port city of Karachi. Pakistan,which some experts think is either a failedstate or on the verge of becoming one, hada better year in terms of its relations withits regional arch-rival, india, and itsbiggest international donor, the Us.

Despite bad governance and the ongo-ing tug of war between Pakistani parliamentand judiciary - and at times between parlia-ment and the military – Pakistan’s civil so-ciety continued to assert itself in 2012 aswell and spoke out against rights abuses, in-stitutional corruption, and in favor of thesupremacy of law and constitution.

Although religious intolerance was onthe rise, secular and progressive Pakistaniscampaigned against controversial religiouslegislation, discrimination against womenand religious minorities and atrocities com-mitted by islamists. Many were awarded oninternational forums for their work.POLITICaL CRISIS: in June, Pakistanplunged into deeper political turmoil as thecountry’s supreme Court disqualified for-mer Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilanifrom holding office, following a contemptconviction in April - a move which manyanalysts said was a setback for Pakistan’snascent democracy. Raja Pervez Ashraf replaced Gilani as PMin June

in April, the court found Gilani guiltyin a contempt case after failing to write aletter to the swiss government to re-opengraft cases against Pakistani President AsifAli Zardari, which the swiss authoritieshad shelved in 2008. The incumbent Pak-istan People’s Party (PPP) governmentsays the cases are ‘’politically motivated”and cannot be re-opened while Zardari re-mains head of state and enjoys presidentialimmunity. Commenting on Gilani’s dis-qualification, Harris Khalique, an islam-abad-based political analyst and humanrights activist, told DW that certain groupshad been pulling the strings from behindto dislodge the civilian government.

“They [those in power] are not beingousted for being corrupt and in-competent; they are being oustedbecause there is a tug of war be-tween institutions about whoholds more power and who actu-ally calls the shots in Pakistan,”Khalique said.

Relations between the gov-ernment and the judiciary re-mained tense throughout theyear. At the start of the year, thePPP government also faced a case in theapex court related to a scandal known as“memogate” revolving around a letter writ-ten to the Us government with the requestto rein in the Pakistani army and its gen-erals to prevent a possible coup followingthe assassination of Osama bin Laden inMay last year. President Zardari and hisgovernment denied any involvement in thescandal, which opposition parties claimedhad undermined Pakistan’s security andnational sovereignty.THe ‘WaR On TeRROR’: Us-Pak-istani relations got off to a rocky start in2012. They had already been greatlystrained by a covert Us special forces op-eration in May the previous year whichkilled al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.The year then started with Pakistan block-

ing NATO supply routes to Afghanistanafter a NATO airstrike killed 24 Pakistanisoldiers in salala near the Afghan borderat the end of 2011. The start of 2012 saw anall-time low in Us-Pakistani relations. Therelations further deteriorated after a NATOairstrike killed 24 Pakistani soldiers insalala military post near the Pakistani-Afghan border last November. in retalia-tion, islamabad blocked NATO supplyroute to Afghanistan.

islamic parties staged demonstrationsagainst the resumption of NATO supplies

Pakistan agreed to reopen NATO sup-ply lines to Afghanistan seven months laterin July, after the Us government apolo-gized for the deaths of Pakistani soldiers.

Malik siraj Akbar, a former Reagan-Fascell Democracy fellow at the NationalEndowment for Democracy (NED) inWashington DC, told DW that both coun-tries had realized they were “gaining noth-ing from the deadlock” and that they hadto go forward.

Observers said islamabad’s decision toresume NATO supplies eased its tensionswith the Us. The Us responded by resum-ing much-needed civilian aid to Pakistan.

As 2012 draws to a close, Us-Pakistanities have improved considerably, with is-lamabad trying to facilitate the Afghanpeace process by helping Washington andKabul in negotiations with the Taliban. Ex-perts, however, warn against too much op-timism on this front. They say thatPakistan’s interests in Afghanistan still

clash with Us policies for the region. islam-abad continued to officially protest againstthe Us drone strikes against al Qaeda andTaliban operatives in Pakistan’s semi-gov-erned northwestern tribal areas and calledthem a violation of its sovereignty.

On the other hand, the Afghan-Pak-istani ties have yet to improve. Both uneasyneighbors have accused each other ofcross-border attacks which took place thisyear. Kabul allefed that Pakistan had beenshelling its territory and threatened to re-port the border violation to the United Na-tions security Council. islamabad hasrepeatedly denied the allegations and hasinstead blamed Afghanistan for propellingrockets onto Pakistani soil.

InDO-PaKISTanI TIeS:Relations between New Delhiand islamabad have also im-proved this year. The 2008terrorist attacks in Mumbaihad been a big set back topeace efforts between the tworival nations. Trade is ex-pected to rise considerablybetween india and Pakistanin the coming years in 2012,

india allowed direct investment from Pak-istan, which trade analysts say is one suchstep towards improved relations.

“Bilateral trade would definitely im-prove relations between Pakistan andindia because business would mean an in-crease in interpersonal contacts,” MoonisAhmar, professor of international relationsat the University of Karachi, told DW.

At the beginning of December, Pak-istani interior Minister Rehman Malik for-malized a new visa agreement with in indiaduring his visit to New Delhi. The newtravel rules make it easier for traders, eld-erly people, tourists, religious pilgrims,members of civil society and children to getvisas. Analysts say that with the hanging ofAjmal Kasab - the sole surviving gunmenof the attacks belonging to Pakistan - in

November, both nations have a chance tobury the hatchet and move ahead.TeRROR aTTaCKS: Taliban militantswreaked havoc on the country throughout2012 as they targeted civilians and at-tacked sensitive military installations.

in August, militants armed with gunsand rocket launchers attacked an air basein the town of Kamra in the Punjabprovince. The large base is home to severalsquadrons of fighter and surveillanceplanes, which air force officials said hadnot been damaged in the attack.

The Taliban indiscriminately killed in-nocent civilians in markets and places ofworship, targeted international and na-tional human rights and charity workers,journalists, and religious and sectarian mi-norities. The Taliban shooting of teenageactivist Malala Yousafzai in northwesternswat valley shocked the entire world. MostPakistanis also condemned the attack onMalala, who is recuperating in the UK.

At least eight people were killed in amilitant attack on an airport in Peshawarin December

The year 2012 has been one of thedeadliest for Pakistan’s shiites. Humanrights groups estimate that more than 300shiites have been killed in Pakistan thisyear so far in sectarian conflict.

in August, several gunmen dressed asPakistani security officials stopped a bustraveling from Rawalpindi to the north-western Gilgit region and dragged the pas-sengers off the bus. The gunmen asked thepassengers to show their identity cards andthen shot 22 shiites at point blank range.

it was the third such incident in sixmonths. Pakistani experts say that althoughshiite Muslims are also murdered in otherparts of Pakistan, those living in the north-western Gilgit-Baltistan region, a predomi-nantly shiite area, face systematic attacksby the Taliban and other militant groups.some experts have even gone so far as call-ing it a “sectarian cleansing” of shiites.

Pakistan in 2012: Between hope and despair

Pakistan and India reviewprogress on CBMsISLaMaBaD: Pakistan and india re-viewed the implementation of existingConfidence Building Measures (CBMs), in-cluding the ceasefire along with the Line ofControl, exchanged ideas to further ad-vance the CBM process and reaffirmedtheir commitment to continue discussionswith the aim of strengthening conventionalCBMs. According to a joint statement is-sued by the Foreign Office following theindia-Pakistan expert-level talks (ELT) onconventional CBMs concluded on Thurs-day, both countries agreed to further en-hance their cooperation in all fields. TheseELT were held under the agreement be-tween the foreign ministers of india andPakistan during their meeting on septem-ber 8 in islamabad.This was the 6th roundof ELT on conventional CBMs betweenindia and Pakistan was held on Thursday(Today) in New Delhi. The indian delega-tion was led by YK sinha, additional secre-tary, the Ministry of External Affairs whileAizaz Ahmad Chaudhry, additional secre-tary Ministry of Foreign Affairs led thePakistani delegation. app

4 afghan police killed with ‘insider’ help: officialsKanDaHaR: Four Afghan policemenwere killed and two injured on Thursday inan insurgent attack assisted by an insiderloyal to the Taliban, officials said.Attackers stormed the police post at TrinKot, a remote district in the southernprovince of Uruzgan, before dawn andkilled the officers as they slept, policespokesman Farid Ahmad Aiel said.One policeman who fled with the insur-gents was believed to be a Taliban infiltra-tor who aided the attack, Aiel said.“He had links with the Taliban and hehelped the Taliban to attack the post. Hehad called them to attack while the otherpolicemen were sleeping,” the spokesmansaid. Abdullah Hemat, a spokesman for theUruzgan provincial administration, con-firmed the incident and also blamed a Tal-iban infiltrator. One gunman was woundedduring fighting and later arrested, headded. aGenCIeS

LUCKNOWInp

acold wave sweepingthrough the indian stateof Uttar Pradesh hasclaimed more than 30lives in a time span of 24

hours, officials said on Thursday.The maximum number of deaths,

between Wednesday and Thursdaymorning, were reported from Bhadohidistrict where five people succumbed tothe cold. Four people died in Balia and

three each in Allahabad, Mirzapur,sonebhadra, Ghazipur, Barabanki,Chandauli and Azamgarh districts.shrawasti and Mau districts have re-ported one death each, an official said.

The mercury dropped below fourdegrees Celsius in most parts of thestate. Although the thick fog cover hasreceded in some regions, cold windscontinue to add to the troubles of thepeople.

The Met Office in the state capital,Lucknow, does not see any respite fromthe cold weather in the coming days. A

weather official said the dense fog inthe state would make things “far moredifficult” in the next few days.

Although the government has madearrangements of shelter homes andbonfires for the poor and the homeless,37 people perished after the cold waveswept across the state last week.

The thick fog cover has also hitthe rail and air traffic in the state.Many trains were running behindschedule, especially those comingfrom Punjab, Bihar and Delhi, a rail-ways official said.

30 killed as cold wave hits India’s Uttar Pradesh

Peasant’s eyes gougedout over old enmity MuLTan: Eight people allegedly gougedout the eyes of a man over old enmity insheher sultan area of Muzaffargarh. Ac-cording to police, the accused kidnappedBilal, a farmer and a father of eight, at gunpoint while he was working on the fieldsand allegedly gouged out both of his eyeswith a sharp edged weapon. Police tookBilal to Nishtar Hospital Multan and col-lected both his eyes in a shopping bag. Drshahbaz Aslam, a senior registrar of thehospital, said the man was under treat-ment but it is unlikely that he will have hiseyesight restored. sheher sultan policehave registered an FiR against the ac-cused under sections 365, 334, 324, 148and 149 of the Pakistan Penal Code andhave arrested three men, Ghulam Fareed,Riaz and Fayyaz. app

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Comment10


AUFO has made a landing in Pak-istan at a time when everyone ispreparing for elections. Qadri’saddress before the mammothgathering in Lahore left no doubt

that he wanted the elections postponed tillthe political, economic, social and electoralsystems were revolutionised on lines dictatedby him irrespective of the time it takes.

Qadri’s slogan “Save state, not politics”is enough to give one a sense of déjà vu.Haven’t we seen three men on horsebackmouthing similar phrases to justify theoverthrow of civilian governments? Didn’tthey promise to hold fair and free electionssoon after holding the corrupt politiciansaccountable? Didn’t each one end up withsetting new records of corruption duringmore or less decade-long extended tenures?

Many have raised questions aboutQadri’s real motives. He says he is a Pak-istani by birth and a Canadian by choice. Be-fore acquiring Canadian citizenship he triedto rise in politics in Pakistan. As he had po-litical ambitions, Qadri supported Mushar-raf’s referendum, got elected to the NationalAssembly but as Musharraf continued to ig-nore him, he resigned in frustration aftertwo years. if it was kosher to accept electionsunder a military dispensation, why shouldQadri find fault with those being held in ademocratic setup under an Election Com-mission widely considered as neutral?

Qadri subsequently decided to leave thecountry to settle in Canada. Why doesn’t hetake part in the politics of the country of hischoice? if his concerns for the system of acountry he has left are genuine, why didn’t hereturn earlier to campaign for his pro-gramme? With enough time at his disposal hecould have revived the long defunct PakistanAwami Tehrik and collect like-minded peopleto contest the elections and tried to changethe system through parliamentary means.

The method he has chosen is agitationand that too when a peaceful transfer ofpower seems just in sight. Does he want toupset the applecart at someone’s instance?is Qadri really speaking for himself?

The sudden appearance of Qadri createsthe perception that he has suddenly re-ceived a call from somewhere. He speakswith a sense of extraordinary urgency.“Wake up and change the country beforenothing is left to change,” reads a TMQ flexon rickshaws. Qadri managed to gather abig crowd, no doubt, and can gather per-haps a larger one in islamabad. The mis-chief is afoot and it will not take long beforepeople see the hidden hands behind.

There is no doubt a large reservoir of dis-contentment in the country. The parties thatare ruling the centre and the provinces havesingularly failed to address the expectationsof the masses. Poverty has increased. Thegulf between the richest and the poorest haswidened. The government has failed to con-trol the rise in unemployment. The smallerprovinces are the main sufferers with the re-sult that dissatisfaction is on the rise. The at-tacks on religious and sectarian minoritieshave caused disaffection among them. inKarachi, targeted killings have become thehallmark of the present government.

The common man’s rapport with themainstream parties has consequently suffered.All the more so because even at the end ofnearly five years, none seems to be responsiveto his problems. The parties are mostly busyin wheeling and dealing and coalition makinginstead of discussing the ways and means toimprove the plight of the man in the street.

Naturally, someone who can spend hun-dreds of millions of rupees on publicity andhas set up a countrywide system of schoolscan get a large audience. When people startpaying attention to sellers of phony panaceas,it shows the weakness of the institutions.

Who supports Qadri? Not the politicalparties. Nearly all of them, whether in the gov-ernment or opposition, secular or religious,have turned down the demand for the post-ponement of elections and the suggestion toinvolve the army and judiciary in the interimsetup. irrespective of their differences, theyare united on one point: elections on schedule.

Zardari says PPP is ready to go to the‘court of people’ and won’t be deterred bynegative propaganda by its detractors. Elec-tions will be free and fair.

Rejecting Qadri’s suggestion to take onboard army, judiciary and other stakeholderswhile putting in place the interim setup, Kairahas rejected any role for the army and judici-ary in the process. The country’s survival, heasserts, is linked to an uninterrupted demo-cratic system as it has been restored after nu-merous sacrifices. “Allama Tahir-ul-Qadrishould seek the people’s support through pop-ular public vote within the ambit of the consti-tution… No one can be allowed to oppose theconstitution.” The minister believes that someelements are trying to create confusion as the

nation prepares for general elections.Mian Nawaz sharif has said timely elec-

tions are inevitable for country’s stabilityand existence.

Pakistan Tehreek-i-insaaf chief imranKhan considers holding of the general elec-tions on time indispensable for stability in thecountry. “i am very clear on this. There is noway for Pakistan to achieve stability withouttimely elections.” Expressing agreement withsome of the points raised by Qadri, imran be-lieves that the ECP has plenty of time to rec-tify the shortcomings in the electoral systemthat Qadri pointed out. But he repeats that thePTi considers a delay or postponement of theelections will jeopardise stability of Pakistan.

Asfndyar Wali has said the ANP wouldnot tolerate any delay or postponement ofgeneral election as that would be a successfor terrorists who want to sabotage the po-litical and democratic process.

National Party President Dr Abdul MalkBaloch has opposed the postponement ofelections and has warned if any attempt wasmade to interfere in free and fair electionsthen it would be impossible to bring the sit-uation under control.

similarly Jamaat-e-islami’s LiaquatBaloch, MJAH’s sajid Mir, PML-Q’s KamilAli Agha have all strongly opposed the post-ponement of elections.

The media in general has shown nosympathy for the demand to postpone thepolls while a section has been highly criticalof the stand taken by the TMQ leader.

What about the supreme Court whichhas emerged as a major player after therestoration of independent judiciary?

The sC has all along supported timelyelections and has given deadlines to the ECPto fulfil the necessary requirements likepreparation of electoral roles, verifying thevoters lists and delimitation of constituen-cies in Karachi. This shows the apex court’skeenness to see the elections held on time.

Despite Qadri’s suggestion of involvingjudiciary in the process of interim setup,there is little likelihood of the sC agreeingto the postponement of the elections.

And the army? Keeping in view the lawand order situation in the country and theneed felt by army of political support to ef-fectively deal with the militants, there is lit-tle likelihood of the army getting itselfinvolved in a bitter controversy with the po-litical parties. The destabilisation caused bythe resulting strife would be too much forthe system. But then things are not alwaysdone in this country in accordance with thedemands of rationality. With John the Bap-tist already here, can Messiah be far behind?

The writer is a former academic and apolitical analyst.

Arif NizamiEditor

Lahore – Ph: 042-36375963-5 Fax: 042-32535230Karachi – Ph: 021-35381208-9 Fax: 021-35381208Islamabad – Ph: 051-2287414-6 Fax: 051-2287417

Web: www.pakistantoday.com.pk Email: [email protected]

Dedicated to the legacy of the late Hameed Nizami

and a misconstrued policy of reconciliation

Five years after Benazir

While complex social, economic and geographicalforces drive history forward, outstandingindividuals play a crucial role in the process. Fiveyears after the death of Benazir Bhutto, many

wonder if things would have been better had she still been alive.The present PPP government, with Asif Ali Zardari acting as boththe head of the state and co-chairman of the PPP, deserves creditfor the constitutional amendments that restored theparliamentary character of the basic document, extended thescope of provincial autonomy and institutionalised a transparentsystem for holding fair and free elections. it also deserves creditfor the NFC Award which considerably increased the share of theprovinces. it would, however, be unjust to overlook thesupportive role played by the opposition in constitutionalamendments and in the formulation of the Award.

Many expectations from the first ever elected government aboutto complete its five-year tenure remain unfulfilled. The law andorder situation in Karachi and Balochistan has continued todeteriorate, causing widespread suffering. There is a perceptionthat the policy of reconciliation with all, dished out as Benazir’slegacy, has been defined somewhat cynically. This has allowed eachone of the allies, whether political or in the establishment, to act asit suits them best without disturbing one another. The policy hascontributed significantly to the worsening of law and order both insindh and Balochistan. Keeping in view how deftly Banazir handledher allies and opponents while in government and during exile,many think she would have done the balancing act in a way thatbenefited the country rather than only the individual players. Whatis more, Benazir would not have yielded the civilian government’slegitimate turf to powerful institutions as easily as the presentgovernment has done time and again. Her presence would thushave put democracy on a firmer basis. With her outstandingintellect and much better understanding of international relations,Pakistan might have avoided blunders that poisoned its relationswith the West while the process of improvement of ties with theneighbours would have been at a faster track.

Many who miss BB today fail to understand why hermurderers and those who planned the crime or helped the killersdirectly or indirectly continue to remain unpunished even afterfive years. There has been no dearth of investigations orderedinto the mystery, including those conducted by the agencies, theJiT, scotland Yard and the UN Commission of inquiry. someprovided definite clues. Many wonder if the lack of action isagain dictated by a misconstrued policy of reconciliation.

Who wants the elections to be postponed?

By Aziz-ud-Din Ahmad

Qadri’s irrational demands

Few will question the assertion thatwe as a nation are staring into an ex-istential cliff – a predicament that

has been brought about by our own de-structive failings, delusions and obsessions.if our national experience is any indicator,there seems to be at least five fundamentalprerequisites for Pakistan, not necessarilyin the order below, to move away from theabyss and turn towards a modern, dy-namic, progressive and prosperous path.

First and foremost is the paramountprerequisite for decisively confronting theviolence, terrorism and mayhem being in-flicted by the Taliban/jihadists’ assault onthe state of Pakistan and its people andneutralising it to an ineffective level if nottotally eliminating it. Why? Because these

self-confessed enemies of our countryhave paralysed the nation’s social andeconomic life while casting a debilitatingnet of fear over the country.

This can only be achieved by an all-out, no holds barred attack. Half-hearted,piecemeal operations here and there haveproven to be catastrophic, playing intoTalibans’ hands. i know that many peoplewill doubt our ability and capacity to crushterrorism, but if tiny sri Lanka with its tinyarmy can do it then why can’t our fifthbiggest army of the world go all out andfinish off this monster once and for all?

secondly, interlinked with the evanes-cence of terrorism/jihadism, is the needto cleanse the country of the blood of tensof thousands of our murdered innocentcitizens through pursuing, prosecutingand punishing the Taliban/jihadi murder-ers. The reason is that any edifice built onthe shaky and guilt-ridden foundation ofa blood-soaked soil would not last forlong: only justice for the fallen victimsand retribution for the perpetrators canmake the country whole again and restorethe moral authority and writ of the state.

America’s war or not, the fact remainsthat someone did murder our citizens in coldblood and they must be held accountableand made to pay for these execrable crimes.

Thirdly, religion-related provisions ofour Constitution, the fountainhead of our

laws, must be discarded or amended. Be-cause they negate some of the very basichuman rights, foster uncertainty and con-fusion, promote inveterate hatred ofother faiths and division among citizens,encourage backwardness, impedeprogress and undermine the rule of law.

For instance, the constitution on the onehand says that all citizens of Pakistan areequal under the law, but on the other handspecifies that citizens who are not Muslimscannot become the prime minister or presi-dent of the country. isn’t this a most brazencontradiction or what? similarly, open dis-crimination is legalised by the constitutionby its Hudood and blasphemy provisions.

Moreover, prohibition that no lawswould be made repugnant to islamic in-junctions and teachings creates utterconfusion because these terms are left upin the clouds, undefined, undeterminedand open for anybody’s interpretation.

The fourth fundamental prerequisiteis the abolition of those clauses in ourconstitution that gives unbridled ‘suomotu’ powers to the judiciary, powers un-heard of in a democracy. The reason isthat the potential for abuse of this addi-tional, unnecessary jurisdiction by an am-bitious judge can create an unelectedsupra government answerable to no one,a kind of a state within a state, so to speak.

Under the pretext of ruling on matters

of ‘public importance’ or ‘larger nationalinterest’ or enforcement of ‘fundamentalrights’, a double-talking and usurping ju-diciary can arbitrarily rule on any matterunder the sun, from fixing prices ofsamosas, CNG etc, to appointments andtransfers of army generals, civil servants,even judges etc, disqualifications ofelected MNAs, MPAs and even primeministers who are the democratically-elected heads of the national government.

These provisions are a tool by which aconniving and corrupt judiciary can over-ride and arrogate to itself the powers ofthe other branches of the government,thus subverting the constitution and thesovereign will of the people.

The fifth essential requirement ischoosing a set of competent and dynamicleaders at the helm of our affairs who havethe strength to lift the nation out of thedeep hole of despair, destruction and doomand who have the fearlessness and vision tosteer the ship of the state towards a pros-perous, modern and harmonious harbour.

Many of our citizens may legitimatelyask: What about our burning problems andissues like good governance, endemic cor-ruption, ubiquitous poverty, massive illit-eracy, education, health, power and energyshortages, lack of necessary infrastructure,religious intolerance, fanaticism, safety oflife and property, huge unemployment,

stunted economic growth, etc, etc?This concern is understandable, but

that precisely is the purpose and task ofelected leadership and government: toaptly, diligently and effectively tackle andresolve people’s problems and country’s is-sues within the framework of democracyand freedom. Once the foregoing basic,structural requirements are met, the electedgovernment and the nation will be poisedand ready to handle and effectively resolvehot national issues and people’s problems.

The nation’s quest for realising itsdestiny lies in tatters; our march forprogress and prosperity has been broughtto a grinding halt as a result of the perni-cious effects of the factors highlightedabove. Are we strong and determinedenough to take the bull by the horn andchallenge these destructive forces? Or,are we weak and cowering and content tokick the can further down the road?

if we opt to choose the latter course,to leave for the next or future generationsto confront and remedy these fundamen-tal defects, then the danger is that withthe current existential cliff staring us inthe face, there might not be a next gen-eration of Pakistani citizens.

The writer is a corporate attorneyand an analyst. He can be contacted at:[email protected]

on how we can make our country a truly modern and progressive state

By Tausif Kamal

Prerequisites for Pakistan’s survival

LHR 28-12-2012_Layout 1 12/28/2012 5:34 AM

several myths surrounding thepartition of india have becomecommon perceptions in the his-

torical discourse. One such myth is thatthe British presented Pakistan on theplatter to the Muslims because theyfavoured the Muslim League and weredeadly opposed to the Congress party’sdemand of united india and its ‘anti-imperialist’ leaders Gandhi and Nehru.Professor Muhammad iqbal Chawla inhis doctoral dissertation entitled,“Wavell and the dying days of the Raj”has smashed this myth intosmithereens after researching hun-dreds of historical sources, particularlythe unpublished private papers of overtwo dozen top British politicians andkey officials involved with the policy-making during the transfer of power.

This myth gained currency prima-rily due to two factors: one wasGandhi’s unsubstantial claim that the‘Two Nation Theory’ was a British cre-ation; and two, Jawaharlal Nehru’s as-sertion that there were only two partiesin india i.e., the British and the Con-gress. This myth was strengthened bythe Congress allegation that the Lahore

Resolution was dic-tated and encour-aged by ViceroyLinlithgow (1936-43) whereas he ison the record tohave termed it a“silly Muslimscheme for parti-tion”. Dr Chawlarejects this premiseby arguing thatmost of the Britishpolicymakers suchas Churchill,Amrey, Cripps andAtlee ardently sup-ported united indiaand vehemently op-posed the idea ofPakistan.

Of these, Pre-mier Atlee and theCabinet MinisterCripps stoopedquite low to ap-pease the Congress.For example,within one monthof assuming pre-miership in July1945, Atlee not onlylifted the ban onCongress but alsoordered the releaseof all of its impris-

oned leaders. Next, he pressuredViceroy Wavell to accept sir MauriceGwyer, the pro-Congress former ChiefJustice of india as his political advisor.On 13th April, 1946, Atlee shot a letterto Wavell and the Cabinet Mission withthe explicit instructions to ensure aunited india and nullify the demand ofPakistan. Even a Hindu historianDurga Das’s account of a meeting withAtlee testifies this fact in which Atlee“did not conceal his deep agitation overthe Muslim demand for Pakistan” andpromised to work for the ‘federal unity’of the subcontinent because he consid-ered Congress as “the true advocate forfreedom and the League a disruptionistone”.

Now, a variety of historical evi-dence has been brought to light tojudge the extent of the members of theCabinet Mission – AV Alexander,Pethick-Lawrence and stafford Cripps– to appease the Congress during thecrucial negotiations at the cost of Jin-nah and the League. Historian Richardsymonds has revealed that both Crippsand Pethick-Lawrence conducted al-most daily secret meetings with AgathaHarrison and CF Andrews, who wereassociates of Gandhi and HoraceAlexander, who acted as an intermedi-ary between Gandhi and the British of-ficialdom – the trio being ‘sold to theGandhi’ in the eyes of Viceroy Wavell.

Moreover, sudhir Ghosh, the au-thor of ‘Gandhi’s emissary’ has self-confessed the underhand dealings ofthe Cabinet Mission with the Congressby stating that at critical junctures dur-ing the parleys, Cripps and Lawrencesecretly met Gandhi “in the garden atthe back of the Viceroy’s House” with-out the knowledge of the ViceroyWavell or other indian leaders. Thisdirty game must have been quite test-ing for Wavell, who confided in‘Viceroy’s Journal’ that Cripps “is soldto the Congress point of view” andcomplained to Alexander that “Crippshad not been quite straight” to theMuslim League. The disgusted Viceroydid not resign just because his expo-sure of the scandalous conduct of thesethree members of the Cabinet Missionwould have caused big embarrassmentto His Majesty’s Government back inLondon.

Not only that Atlee’s Cabinet Min-isters shredded the ideals of fair playand honesty in thin air during thecourse of their talks to win over Con-gress and deprive League of its demandof Pakistan but Pethick-Lawrence alsoused provocative language and irre-

sponsible remarks about League’sleader Jinnah for which he had to apol-ogise later on. Despite this dirty game,when the Mission proposed a unitedindia with one federal government, thelarge hearted Jinnah accepted it for thegreater good but Nehru as the presi-dent of the Congress rejected the Cabi-net Mission Plan by stating, “We arenot bound by a single thing except thatwe had decided for the moment to goto the Constituent Assembly”, makingMaulana Azad to comment thatNehru’s statement was “one of thosemost unfortunate events whichchanged the course of history”. Nehru’spolitical biographer, Michael Breecherfound his utterances “the most fieryand provocative” in his four decades ofpublic life, and to the Hindu historianBipan Chandra, “Nehru’s approach tothe communal problem proved to be acomplete failure because of its very im-practicability”.

it is possible to conjecture that hadthe ‘impractical’ Nehru been not cata-pulted to the presidentship of Congressby unseating of Azad by Gandhi, “thesuper-president of the Congress” —who had formally left the party in 1943yet continued to pull strings from be-hind — the history of the subcontinentmight have been different. The truecolours of Gandhi, the “apostle of non-violence” came to the fore when he in-tensely lobbied with Wavell to installCongress in power in the interim Gov-ernment after the League had with-drawn the acceptance of the CabinetMission Plan as a result of Nehru’s rashstatement. During a meeting withWavell, Gandhi insisted that “forceshould be used against the Muslims ifthey resisted against the Congress gov-ernment”. This shows that Gandhi waswilling to bid goodbye to his creed ofnon-violence to acquire power.

Wavell, who initially, had a highopinion of ‘Mahatma’, was aghast. Anentry in his ‘Viceroy’s Journal’ sum-marises this evolution in the Gandhianthought: “Gandhi at the end exposedCongress policy of domination morenakedly than ever before. The more isee that old man, the more i regard himas an unscrupulous old hypocrite; hewould shrink from no violence andblood-letting to achieve his endsthough he would naturally prefer to doso by chicanery and false show of mild-ness and friendship.”

The writer is an academic andjournalist. He can be reached [email protected]

Comment 11


eye on HistoryBy Basharat Hussain Qizilbash

Forgotten principles

of the founderMuch has been written and said

about Quaid-e-Azam MuhammadAli Jinnah. However, little hasbeen implemented by maintainingthe true essence of his preciousguidelines. The easy-to-understandpercepts of the founding fatherhave been reserved for historicalarchives, political sloganeering andrhetoric. Every year, August 14 andDecember 25 seem to be a ripetime for commemorating whatshould have been established as‘law of the land’, till now. Thesedates on the calendar areunconditionally meant to spurt outthe love for the country. The ‘GoGreen’ furore encapsulates us(Pakistanis), twice a year (add twomore to it if there is a cricket matchbetween Pakistan and india).Zealous ‘spirits of nationalism’,undoubtedly, should be portrayed,but not at the expense of theirinstitutionalisation. Referring toM A Jinnah, during verbosespeeches, substantiates thearguments of the present dayleaders without ameliorating thedistraught status quo.

Akbar s Ahmed in his well-wrote book, ‘Jinnah, Pakistan andIslamic Identity: the search forSaladin’, questions the Pakistanileadership that has there been aplan devised to marginalise the‘real Jinnah’? if not, then what isthe record of Pakistan forpromoting Jinnah’s stand on theinternational stage? The answersare still to be extracted and theprocedure, like others prevailing inPakistan, is not that easy. For thepast 65 years, political boutsamong the self-appointedcustodians of Pakistan’s ideology,power-hungry politicians, thebelligerent bureaucracy and so-called military saviours haveenslaved the inspiring miracle ofthe 21st century.

instead of focusing on theessential messages of the founder,divergence over interpretations ofhis speeches has segregated the

nation. ‘Debating Jinnah’outweighed the acquisition of‘visionary Jinnah’. To this day,attempts are being made todeconstruct Jinnah’s inclinationtowards secularism or islamicpolity. Construing most of hisspeeches would lead to theconclusion that majority of thenotions presented areaccomodative of both the mindsets(religious and secularist).

it is a matter of common senseto utilise the ‘irrefutablecommonalities’ for buildingimmutable blueprint ofgovernance. The most simplisticexample revolves around thegolden motto of ‘unity, faith anddiscipline’. A clear manifestation ofany three, on part of the Pakistanileadership, has not been witnessed.

Being a human, Jinnah too hada right to hold some personalliberty in views and actions. Ourfailure lies in the unfairdemarcation of his subjective andobjective opinions. All this hasdragged the illiterate majority intoa state of self-pity and oblivion,which some people term as‘identity crisis’ nowadays. The‘intellectual demise’ of Pakistanipolitics had a ‘trickle-down effect’that limited Quaid’s principleswithin ‘portrait frames’, bank notesand floozy declamations.

Nations have an inherenttendency to learn this behaviourwhen they fail to translate ‘wordsof wisdom’ into ‘actions of value’.Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad AliJinnah believed in the ‘power toact’ and advocated appropriateactions. He adopted struggle as hispassion, not as a way for achievingdesired results. His achievementswere a by-product of his untiringdevotion towards his passion. Thisis the reason that his name willrest in world history as a man whoaltered the globe.

Pakistanis have an examplethat needs to be emulated throughsincerity with their respectiveprofessions. Quaid-e-Azam’sjustice with his profession madehim the father of Pakistan. He wasnot a priest, philosopher, poet,writer or even a politician. in fact,Jinnah was an incorruptiblelawyer, who won the biggest caseof his life in the international courtof justice the day Pakistan cameinto existence. For all theexplanations implicitly stated inthis piece of writing, i couldn’tmuster the courage to end it with aquotation of Quaid-e-AzamMuhammad Ali Jinnah.

FAKIHA HASSAN RIZVILahore

Editor’s mailSend your letters to: Letters to

Editor, Pakistan Today, 4-ShaareyFatima Jinnah, Lahore, Pakistan.

Fax: +92-42-36298302. E-mail: [email protected].

Letters should be addressed to Pakistan Today exclusively.

the British supported Congress’ united India over League’s pakistan

Dirty game before partition

LHR 28-12-2012_Layout 1 12/28/2012 5:35 AM


12

salman Khan's fans convergeat Bandra court to see himHundreds of fans of Bollywood actorsalman Khan turned up at the Bandracourt to catch a glimpse of theirfavourite star who was summoned by aMagistrate for his involvement in a hitand run case. Most people waited pa-tiently in the compound of the court tosee the actor, who turned 47 today.salman was asked to appear before aMetropolitan Magistrate on a com-plaint that he had allegedly delayed thetrial in connivance with police. Astrong posse of policemen guarded thecourt and its precincts and did not

allow salman's fans to go upto courtnumber 9, which is located on the firstfloor of the building in suburban Ban-dra. Many fans of the actor stood onthe bridge overlooking the court build-ing while others waited at the two en-trances apparently to say best of luckto the "Dabangg" hero. The actor, how-ever, did not come to the court al-though his two sisters Alvira andArpita were spotted along with lawyerDipesh Mehta. Ahmed Patel, a diehardfan of salman, told that he was fromGujarat and had come here to meet his

relatives. As he had read innewspapers that salmanwas summoned today bythe court he had come tomeet the actor. RajuMehta, another fan ofsalman, said he arrived atthe court at 10 AM to get avantage seat so that hecould see the proceedingsfrom a close distance. "i willcome again on January 30when the matter would beheard again," he said. neWS DeSK

Aamir is a livinglegend: Kareena

actress Kareena Kapoor calls actor Aamir Khan a

living legend. "Aamir is a living legend. he has

a beautiful mind and he definitely is one of the

finest actors of all time," Kareena said on a TV show.

The actor is competing with the likes of Amitabh

Bachchan, Sachin Tendulkar, A.R. Rahman and

Narendra Modi for the title of "India's Prime Icon".

Kareena's elder sister Karisma Kapoor, who has worked

with Aamir in Raja hindustani, also heaped praise at

the actor. "Aamir is most definitely an icon and a true

legend. he is always up to something new and

different. I've had the opportunity of working with him

in iconic films like Raja hindustani and Andaaz Apna

Apna," Karisma said. "I'm really happy that after

Talaash and 3 Idiots even Kareena-Aamir jodi has

become a hit pair," she added. neWS DeSK

The 18th death anniversary of noted poetess

Parveen Shakir was observed in Karachi on

Wednesday by the literary circles. Parveen Shakir

died in an accident on December 26, 1994 on her way to

office. her death was a great loss to the Urdu poetry.

Chairman Academy of Letters Abdul hameed, while talking

to APP, said she set a new trend in the Urdu poetry. She

used the first person feminine pronoun, which is rarely

used even by female poets, he added. “Parveen portrayed

the women’s issues in her poestry in a beautiful manner

and adopted purely an eastern style,” he said. She was a

noted Urdu poetess, teacher and a civil servant. It was a

unique honour for her that there was a question on her

poetry in the Urdu paper in the 1982 Central Superior

Services examination, in which she appeared. She did her

masters in english Literature and Linguistics from Karachi

University. She worked as a professor at Karachi University

and Trinity College, Connecticut, USA, for nine years

before joining the Civil Service, where she served in the

Customs Department. She was appointed second

secretary, CBR in 1986. She again joined Trinity College,

Connecticut, USA, in 1990, and did her masters in Public

Administration from harvard University in 1991. Parveen

started writing, both prose and poetry, at a young age.

She also wrote columns in Urdu newspapers, and a few

articles in english dailies. Initially, she wrote under the

pen-name, “Beena”. The feminine perspective of love and

the associated social problems were her theme. Critics

compared her poetry to that of Iranian poet Forough

Farrokhzad. her first book, Khushboo, won the Adamjee

Award. Later she was awarded the Pride of Performance.

Upon her death, the Parveen Shakir Trust was established

by her close friend, Parveen Qadir Agha. The Parveen

Shakir Trust organizes a yearly function and gives out the

Aks-e-Khushbo award. neWS DeSK

18th death anniversary ofParveen Shakir observed

BOLLYWOOD and controversies gohand in hand and the year gone by wasno different as stars continued to hogheadlines with their share of publicfights and scandals.

The year started with the news of superstarshah Rukh Khan getting involved in an alleged"slapgate" with his former best friend FarahKhan's director husband shirish Kunder.

Khan, who is otherwise known for his gentleand witty demeanour, apparently lost his coolwith Kunder at a celebration bash for HrithikRoshan-starrer "Agneepath".

Kunder had been provoking the actor forsometime by making uncharitable remarksagainst his ambitious project 'Ra.One'.

However, unlike his fight with salman Khansome years ago, the latest brawl ended on a pos-itive note. Kunder and Farah met Khan andsorted out their differences. The actor has also re-sumed his professional relationship with Farah.

sRK got involved in another public spat withthe officials at the Wankhede stadium. The actor,who owns an iPL team, was accused of misbehav-ing with the security personnel there for not al-lowing him and his entourage to enter the cricketground.

However, shah Rukh defended himself say-ing that the security personnel manhandled thekids with him, including his daughter, which ledto the altercation.

sRK was also linked to his 'Don' co-starPriyanka Chopra. it is not clear how the rumourbegan but it is said to be the reason behind sRK'sbest friend Karan Johar and Chopra's cold war,which spilled out onto Twitter.

Though not directly involved, sRK was in

news again when his friend and former co-starKajol's husband Ajay Devgn took legal actionagain Yash Raj Films over the release of Khan-starrer 'Jab Tak Hai Jaan'.

Yash Chopra's last film ran into trouble withDevgn claiming that his 'son Of sardar' was notgetting enough screens due to the dominant po-sition of YRF with the distributors, an allegationdenied by the production house.

Another Khan to create controversy was saif.Even though it was a great year for the actor, whotied the knot with his long-time girlfriend Ka-reena Kapoor, said faced controversy when hegot involved in a scuffle with an NRi business-man named iqbal sharma in Mumbai.

At a dinner with his friends and Kareena atWasabi, a Japanese restaurant in the Taj Mahalhotel - saif allegedly hit iqbal after he asked theactor to tone down his noisy party.

saif denied hitting the man first and said hewas defending himself after iqbal came on him.saif was briefly detained and now both partieshave filed cases against each other.

The scandal involving veteran star RajeshKhanna and Anita Advani was yet another one totake the industry by surprise.

Anita, who claimed to be Khanna's live-inpartner, approached court after the superstar'sdeath in July, saying Khanna's son-in-law AkshayKumar and wife Dimple Kapadia were denyingher share in the property.

Bachchan bahu Aishwarya might have beenaway from the big screen for long now but she re-mained in news thanks to her post baby flab. The'Devdas' star came under fire for not losingweight even a year after giving birth to herdaughter. Aishwarya took on the critics by mak-

ing a stunning appearance at Cannes.Aamir Khan earned praise for his debut TV

show 'satyamev Jayate' but it also landed him incontroversy with the indian medical associationdemanding an apology from the actor for under-mining doctors. The actor refused to apologize.

Melody queen Lata Mangeshkar addressedher famous fallout with Mohammed Rafi in an in-terview, which ended up angering the latesinger's son shahid. in the interview,Mangeshkar said that she stopped singing withRafi because of his fierce temper and also theyhad dispute over royalty rights. she said the coldwar ended only when Rafi apologized to her inwriting. However, shahid lashed out atMangeshkar, saying if she had any letter then sheshould show it.

Rani Mukerji's brother Raja was accused ofmolestation by TV actress Priya Mishra and wasalso arrested after she filed a police complaint.Raja, who has a wife and a daughter, is currentlyout on bail.

The year's most loved movie 'Barfi!', alsoindia's entry for the Oscars, landed in troublewith critics who accused that the film was copiedfrom various Hollywood movies.

Director Anurag Basu said he did take inspi-ration from old Hollywood classics but it wasonly as a tribute. The film is out of the Oscar raceafter it failed to make it to the nine shortlistedfilms.

Director shirish Kunder's project 'Joker' mayhave failed to bring audience at the box office butit generated enough news otherwise. The directorand producer blamed the film's failure on its leadactor Akshay Kumar, who was absent from filmpromotions. neWS DeSK

BOLLYWOOD'S BRUSH WITH CONTROVERSIES IN 2012

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13

The 25-year-old New Orleans native turned

the homophobic hip-hop world on its head

when he posted an open letter to his Tumblr

account back on July 4 describing his first

great love—with a man. And buzz was

initially soft on the sultry R&B crooner due to

his association with the demented alt hip-

hop collective OFWGKTA. But Ocean’s debut

album, Channel Orange, a moody meditation

on life, love, and loss in the City of Angels,

managed to transcend sex, race, and genre.

It’s an impassioned, tender, and grandiose

R&B saga featuring heartbreaking ballads

that touch on unrequited love (“Thinkin Bout

You,” “Bad Religion”), religious symbolism

(“Pyramids”), and much more.

FRANK OCEANCHANNEL ORANGE1

Bloom, the fourth album from Baltimore-

based indie-pop duo Victoria Legrand and

Alex Scally, is a dense, ethereal work—

like a gratifying voyage across a sonic

dreamscape. Anthems slowly swell up ‘til

they reach the heavens, before shattering

into millions of lovely little pieces. In

truth, it’s hard to describe exactly what

Beach house accomplishes on this album.

It’s like a pastiche of pleasurable moods

punctuated by Legrand’s Nico-esque

vocals that cut through the walls of sound

like luscious daggers. You’ll notice new,

subtle musical stylings each time you

listen to this, one of the richest and

aurally rewarding albums of the year.

BEACH HOUSEBLOOM2

Like Frank Ocean, Kendrick Lamar

Duckworth—or just Kendrick Lamar, as he’s

known—is 25 and just coming into his own

as an artist. After releasing four mixtapes

and an independent album, the Compton

native’s first studio album, good kid

M.A.A.D. city, was released on fellow

Comptonite Dr. Dre’s Aftermath label to

near-universal acclaim. Lamar combines the

lyrical dexterity and introspection of Tupac

with the levity, catchiness, and quotables of

Lil Wayne, over atmospheric beats courtesy

of Dre and Co. It’s a despairing yet

beauteous concept album about struggling

to make ends meet on the streets of

Compton that warrants repeat listens.

KENDRICK LAMARGOOD KID, M.A.A.D. CITY3

Borrowing heavily from the Beatles—

when they were heavily into acid—this

Aussie quintet, spearheaded by singer-

songwriter Kevin Parker, combines

dreamy, neo-psychedelic melodies with

superb lyrics expounding on

isolationism and loneliness. Songs like

“Why Won’t They Talk to Me?” and

“Feels Like We Only Go Backwards” are

sonically audacious, hypnotic tunes oft

complemented by empyreal vocals,

sing-along choruses, reverb-heavy

guitar, and cymbal crashes. This is the

sophomore album that MGMT wishes

they’d made.

TAME IMPALALONERISM4

OK, the full name for the latest LP from

tortured chanteuse Fiona Apple is this:

The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver

of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will

Serve You More Than Ropes Will ever Do.

Phew. It’s the singer-songwriter’s first

album since 2005’s Grammy-nominated

extraordinary Machine, and the hiatus has

done her a world of good. While The Idler

Wheel is no easy listen, after a couple of

spins, you’ll be rewarded with one of the

more strange, avant-garde, and beguiling

albums of the year. Shifting from frank,

spare ballads to melancholy, jazzy ditties,

Apple cements her status as one of the

most singular songbirds of her generation.

FIONA APPLETHE IDLER WHEEL…5

London-based indie-pop quartet Allo

Darlin’ dials down the twee a bit for its

sophomore effort, europe—a melodious

collection of toe-tappable anthems

that’s pure aural bliss. Aussie singer

elizabeth Morris’s airy, accented vocals

are perfectly complemented by light

guitar strums and effortlessly

sharp lyrics. This is the ideal album for

leisurely drives through the

countryside—or to serve as

a lovely counterpoint to the drudgery

of city life. Morris croons on

the title track, “This is life. This is

living.” Indeed.

ALLO DARLIN’EUROPE6

At just 23, country singer-songwriter

Taylor Swift has become a full-blown

pop star with her fourth studio

album, Red. Allegedly inspired by her

messy breakup with actor Jake

Gyllenhaal, it’s an uneven LP that

nonetheless contains a diverse array

of infectious tunes, from

U2-esque rock ballads (“State of

Grace”) to sing-along anthems (“We

Are Never ever Getting Back

Together”) to the

pop-dubstep hybrid “I Knew You

Were Trouble,” which is arguably the

best pop song of the year.

TAYLOR SWIFTRED7

Speaking of dubstep, few DJs had a bigger

year than Skrillex. The 24-year-old Los

Angeles native with the trademark lopsided

hairdo caused a stir when he won three

Grammy awards in February. Just two

months prior to that, rap maestro Kanye

West tweeted his ringing endorsement of

Skrillex’s Bangarang eP, which was later

released as a physical album in January. The

seven-track mini-album is a searing genre-

bending blend of house, dubstep bass

wobbles, and electro-stomp clangers that is

thrilling, madcap fun. While it all goes down

better in a live setting, replete with awe-

inspiring visual accompaniment, you haven’t

really heard anything like this before.

SKRILLEXBANGARANG EP8

This four-piece band from Athens,

Ala., deftly fused garage and

blues-rock on its debut album, Boys

& Girls.

Buoyed by rockabilly guitars and

lead singer Brittany howard’s Joplin-

like vocals, Alabama Shakes

provide a fresh, energetic take on

an old-school Americana sound.

You’ll shake and groove to this

collection of soulful, rhythmic ditties

that deservedly received three

Grammy nominations, including Best

New Artist.

ALABAMA SHAKESBOYS & GIRLS9

Grimes is the stage name of 24-

year-old experimental electronic

artist Claire Boucher. The Canadian’s

singular synthpop-meets-electronic-

meets-industrial sound is

reminiscent of Björk, with a touch of

Cocteau Twins and, vocally, a pinch

of K-Pop. her first studio album,

Visions, was recorded entirely on

Apple’s GarageBand program over

the course of three weeks in

Boucher’s cramped apartment. The

result is a quixotic, inventive, and

most of all addictive album that’s

just a damn good time.

GRIMESVISIONS10

I had my doubts about the

sophomore album from Passion Pit, a

danceable synthpop quintet from

Cambridge, Mass., but Gossamer is a

huge leap forward from a maturation

standpoint. The trite—albeit

addictive—electro ditties on its

debut, Manners, have been replaced

by angry, powerful anthems about

unemployment, disillusionment, and

social, economic, and political

anxieties that plague many

Millennials. It’s a call to arms

disguised as mercurial dance-pop

and goes down very, very smoothly.

PASSION PITGOSSAMER11

Because of its punk and alt-rock

stylings, the third album from

these natives of Scranton, Pa.,

went criminally overlooked. On

the Impossible Past will

transport you back to your

halcyon, angsty teenage years.

It’s fast, raw, and thrillingly

alive.

THE MENZINGERSON THE IMPOSSIBLE PAST12

LAST YEAR, SILKY RAPPER DRAKE STOOD ATOP MANY CRITICS’ LISTS FOR BEST ALBUM OF THE YEAR. BUT 2012 WAS ALLABOUT R&B CROONER FRANK OCEAN. FROM OCEAN’S ‘CHANNEL ORANGE’ TO FIONA APPLE’S AVANT-GARDE STYLINGSAND TAYLOR SWIFT’S POWER-POP ANTHEMS, HERE ARE THE DAILY BEAST’S BEST MUSIC ALBUMS OF THE YEAR.

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AT Olduvai Gorge, where ex-cavations helped to con-firm Africa was the cradleof humanity, scientistsnow find the landscape

once fluctuated rapidly, likely guid-ing early human evolution. Thesefindings suggest that key mental de-velopments within the human line-age may have been linked with ahighly variable environment, re-searchers added. Olduvai Gorge is aravine cut into the eastern margin ofthe serengeti Plain in northern Tan-zania that holds fossils of hominins— members of the human lineage.Excavations at Olduvai Gorge byLouis and Mary Leakey in the mid-1950s helped to establish the Africanorigin of humanity. To learn moreabout the roots of humanity, scien-tists analyzed samples of leaf waxespreserved in lake sediments at Oldu-vai Gorge, identifying which plantsdominated the local environmentaround 2 million years ago. This wasabout when Homo erectus, a directancestor of modern humans whoused relatively advanced stone tools,appeared. "We looked at leaf waxes,because they're tough, they survivewell in the sediment," researcherKatherine Freeman, a biogeochemistat Pennsylvania state University,said in a statement. After four yearsof work, the researchers focused oncarbon isotopes — atoms of the sameelement with different numbers ofneutrons — in the samples, whichcan reveal what plants reigned overan area. The grasses that dominatesavannas engage in a kind of photo-synthesis that involves both normalcarbon-12 and heavier car-bon-13, while trees andshrubs rely on a kindof photosynthesisthat prefers car-bon-12. (Atomsof carbon-12each possess sixn e u t r o n s ,while atoms of

carbon-13 have seven). scientists hadlong thought Africa went through aperiod of gradually increasing dry-ness — called the Great Drying —over 3 million years, or perhaps onebig change in climate that favoredthe expansion of grasslands acrossthe continent, influencing humanevolution. However, the new re-search instead revealed "strong evi-dence for dramatic ecosystemchanges across the African savanna,in which open grassland landscapestransitioned to closed forests overjust hundreds to several thousands ofyears," researcher Clayton Magill, abiogeochemist at Pennsylvania stateUniversity, told Livescience. The re-searchers discovered that OlduvaiGorge abruptly and routinely fluctu-ated between dry grasslands anddamp forests about five or six timesduring a period of 200,000 years. "iwas surprised by the magnitude ofchanges and the rapid pace of thechanges we found," Freeman toldLivescience. "There was a completerestructuring of the ecosystem fromgrassland to forest and back again, atleast based on how we interpret thedata. i've worked on carbon isotopesmy whole career, and i've never seenanything like this before."

Losing waterThe investigators also con-

structed a highly detailedrecord ofw a t e rh i s -toryi n

Olduvai Gorge by analyzing hydro-gen isotope ratios in plant waxes andother compounds in nearby lake sed-iments. These findings support thecarbon isotope data, suggesting theregion experienced fluctuations inaridity, with dry periods dominatedby grasslands and wet periods char-acterized by expanses of woodycover. "The research points to theimportance of water in an arid land-scape like Africa," Magill said in astatement. "The plants are so inti-mately tied to the water that if youhave water shortages, they usuallylead to food insecurity." The re-search team's statistical and mathe-matical models link the changes theysee with other events at the time,such as alterations in the planet'smovement. "The orbit of the Eartharound the sun slowly changes withtime," Freeman said in statement."These changes were tied to the localclimate at Olduvai Gorge throughchanges in the monsoon system inAfrica." Earth's orbit around the suncan vary over time in a number ofways — for instance, Earth's orbitaround the sun can grow more orless circular over time, and Earth'saxis of spin relative to the sun'sequatorial plane can also tilt backand forth. This alters the amount ofsunlight Earth receives, energy that

drives Earth's atmosphere. "slightchanges in the amount of sunshinechanged the intensity of atmosphericcirculation and the supply of water.The rain patterns that drive the plantpatterns follow this monsoon circu-lation. We found a correlation be-tween changes in the environmentand planetary movement." The teamalso found links between changes atOlduvai Gorge and sea-surface tem-peratures in the tropics. "We findcomplementary forcing mechanisms— one is the way Earth orbits, andthe other is variation in ocean tem-peratures surrounding Africa," Free-man said. These findings now shedlight on the environmental shifts theancestors of modern humans mighthave had to adapt to in order to sur-vive and thrive. "Early humans wentfrom having trees available to havingonly grasses available in just 10 to100 generations, and their dietswould have had to change in re-sponse," Magill said in a statement."Changes in food availability, foodtype, or the way you get food cantrigger evolutionary mechanisms todeal with those changes. The resultcan be increased brain size and cog-nition, changes in locomotion andeven social changes — how you in-teract with others in a group." Thisvariability in the environment coin-

cided with a key period inhuman evolution, "whenthe genus Homo was firstestablished and when

there was first evidence oftool use," Magill said.

The researchersnow hope to ex-amine changes atOlduvai Gorge

not just across timebut space, which

could help shed lighton aspects of earlyhuman evolution

such as forag-ing patterns.neWS DeSK

Bullying over health issues iscommon, according to twostudies looking at kids withfood allergies and thosegoing through weight-lossprograms. in one study, al-most 32% of children withfood allergies reported bully-ing or harassment specifi-cally related to their allergy,often involving threats withfood, Eyal shemesh, MD, ofMount sinai Medical Centerin New York City, and col-leagues found. in a secondstudy, 64% of teens atweight-loss camps reportedweight-related victimization,not just by schoolmates butoften by friends, coaches,teachers, and parents too,Rebecca Puhl, PhD, of YaleUniversity, and colleaguesreported. Both studies ap-peared online in Pediatrics.

Because of the immedi-ate and long-term physicaland emotional effects, pedia-tricians and other cliniciansshould get involved in con-crete ways, advised Markschuster, MD, PhD, ofBoston Children's Hospital,and Laura Bogart, PhD, ofHarvard Medical school inBoston, in an accompanying

commentary. They recom-mended anticipatory guid-ance for children and parentsby describing bullying and itsconsequences and teachingparents how to recognizeclues that it's occurring.

shemesh's group ana-lyzed surveys of 251 estab-lished food allergy patients,ages 8 to 17, and their parentsat a single allergy clinic in theEnhancing, Managing, andPromoting Well-Being andResiliency program. Any bul-lying or harassment of thesechildren was reported by 45%of them and 36% of their par-ents, although with pooragreement when related toreasons other than the foodallergy. Being victimized due

specifically to food allergiesaccounted for most of thesecases, with 32% of the food al-lergic kids and about 25% oftheir parents reporting suchbullying. Almost all the bullieswere classmates (80%), andmost bullying happened atschool (60%). The most com-mon form was teasing (42%),followed by waving the aller-gen in front of the child(30%). Notably, 12% hadbeen forced to touch the foodthey are allergic to and 10%had food thrown at them.Bullying was significantly as-sociated with poorer qualityof life scores and greater anx-iety, which the researchersnoted was independent ofallergy severity. neWS DeSK

14Infotainment


Potentially habitable planetfound just 12 light years away?

AN international team of astronomers led byMikko Toumi from the University ofHertfordshire has discovered five new

planets just 12 light years away. Additionally, thediscovery implies that one or two of those planetscould be conducive to life. The five planets arerotating around the star Tau Ceti which is visible inthe night sky and is very similar to our sun. Theastronomers reportedly combined more than 6,000observations from three telescopes in Hawaii, Chile,and Australia to detect the five new planets. Theyestimate that the planets are approximately two tosix times the mass of earth and one them, which isfive times the mass of earth, is found within anhabitable zone know as the "Goldilocks zone." The"Goldilocks" zone is neither too hot nor cold toallow liquid surface water which could support lifeon this explanet. "This discovery is in keeping withour emerging view that virtually every star hasplanets, and that the galaxy must have manypotentially habitable planets," said steven Vogt, theUniversity of California, santa Cruz astronomer onthe international team. Over 800 planets have beendiscovered orbiting other stars and according to theDaily Mail seven of these could potentially supportlife. They include the Gliese 581d, HD 85512b,Kepler 22b, Gliese 667Cc, Gliese 581g, Gliese 163c,and HD 40307g. These potentially habitableexoplanets are called superterrans and aresubstantially larger than Earth. They have all beencataloged in the Habitable Exoplanets Catalog(HEC), a complex computer program created tomeasure the suitability for life of these emerginggalaxies and exoplanets. The program combinesdata from numerous exoplanet databases,including the Extrasolar Planet Encyclopedia andNAsA Exoplanet Archive, and receives most of thedata of new discoveries directly from the researchteams. The information is then analyzed andincorporated into the database once it is ready forpublic announcement. neWS DeSK

Bizarre texts could be sign ofstroke or other health problems

sPEAKiNG gibberish has long been known tobe a telltale sign of a stroke, but how aboutsending nonsensical text messages? it turns

out, those can also be a key indicator of a life-threatening loss of blood supply to the brain -- anewly recognized phenomenon called dystextia. After receiving a series of befuddling texts from his25-year-old pregnant wife regarding her due date, aworried husband recently brought her to Brighamand Women’s Hospital where sure enough,neurologists diagnosed a stroke; they reported thecase in this week’s issue of the journal Archives ofNeurology. “The word dystextia has been usedbefore in the medical literature to describesomeone having a migraine headache who is havingtrouble coordinating fingers to make appropriatetexts,” said Dr. Joshua Klein, a neurologist atBrigham and Women’s. it’s also been used todescribe arm weakness from a previous stroke thathas rendered someone unable to tap out legiblewords. But this is the first reported case of dystextiathat Klein knows of to describe the aphasia thatoccurs in 20 to 40 percent of stroke patients. Thenonsensical texts were the first warning signs thatwere caught, though looking back the woman hadalso had trouble filing out her medical forms in thedoctor’s office earlier that day. neWS DeSK

Kids with health issuestargeted by bullies

Fake dentist used bathroom as office

Aman accused of practicing dentistrywithout a license may have to go through adifferent kind of cavity search if convicted.

investigators in Moorpark, Calif., arrested WilliamEscobar, 40, after a month-long investigation thatrevealed that he gave people cleanings and injectedthem with anesthetics in the bathroom of hisapartment. The officers finally got a bite on himlast month when one dissatisfied customerreported him after suffering swelling in the gums,KABC-TV reported. The patient didn’t have enoughmoney to pay for a tooth extraction so it was notperformed, according to Moorpark Police Dept.sgt. Victor Fazio. Even so, Escobar allegedlythreatened the patient and said he still owedmoney, KNBC-TV reported. When detectivesshowed up at Escobar's apartment with a searchwarrant, they discovered an elaborate and illegaldental office, including the chair, dental tools,anesthetic drugs, as well as false teeth and otherorthodonture items, according toVentura.Edhat.com. Escobar was arrested forseveral charges including felony practice ofdentistry without a license, misdemeanorfurnishing of dangerous drugs, and possession ofneedles, the Los Angeles Times. Police are stillinvestigating and believe the suspect wasspecializing in illegal orthodontics and are hopingto speak with underage patients, according toMoorpark.Patch.com. Escobar had numerouscustomers, including teenagers who were receivingorthodontic care at the apartment. neWS DeSK

Erratic environment may be key to human evolution

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Pakistan seekto win first T20series against India

AHMEDABADaGenCIeS

As india will be looking to quickly plugtheir batting shortcomings and pick theright team composition when they gointo the second and last Twenty20cricket international, Pakistan would beseeking their first T20 series win againstthe arch rivals on Friday. india suffered afive-wicket drubbing in the series openerin Bangalore after a middle-order col-lapse, which saw the hosts struggle to130 for nine after being 90 for two at onestage. Pakistan, however, would be want-ing their top order to show maturity andgive the team a proper stand to have anupper hand in their tour before theyenter into the ODi series. The hosts des-perately need to win the second game tolevel the series and the pressure will beon Captain Mahendra singh Dhoni andhis men to deliver the goods when it mat-ters the most. Apart from Gautam Gamb-hir (43) and Ajinkya Rahane (42), all theother batsmen failed to apply themselveswhen confronted against a strong bowl-ing attack spearheaded by the experi-enced Umar Gul. in fact, all-rounderYuvraj singh and suresh Raina were theonly ones other than the openers to havereached the double figures. india wouldneed the likes of Virat Kohli, Dhoni, Yu-vraj and Rohit sharma to regroup andfire in unison against the traditional ri-vals who are also equally determined toclinch the T20 series. The bowling alsoremains a persistent headache for theindians. Except for BhuvneshwarKumar, who finished with impressivefigures of three for nine in his debutgame, none of the other bowlers couldtrouble the Pakistani batsmen.

MELBOURNEaGenCIeS

Michael Clarke struck a sublime cen-tury to become his country's highesttest run-scorer in a calendar year asAustralia marched to an imperious284-run lead at the close of day two ofthe second test against sri Lanka onThursday. The Australia skipper, en-joying an inspired 2012, surpassed the1,544 runs Ricky Ponting amassed in2005 during his innings of 106, beforetail-ender Mitchell Johnson rubbedsalt into sri Lanka's wounds with anunbeaten 73. Paceman Johnson strodeoff at stumps with Nathan Lyon yet toscore, with Australia having added 108runs in the session after tea to drivetheir total to an imposing 440-8 at theMelbourne Cricket Ground.

"As many runs tomorrow would bevery handy," Clarke told reporters aftercelebrating his first ton at the MCG. "iwould love to see Mitchell get his sec-ond test hundred and then we'll beback out there bowling and hopefully

we can bowl sri Lanka out." sri Lanka,skittled for 156 on day one, had only asix-run lead to protect at the start of theday's play and their hopes of restrictingthe hosts diminished with a hamstringinjury to seamer Chanaka Welegederain the morning session. The remainingbowlers had little assistance from a flat-tening pitch on a gusty day and were

put to the sword by Clarke and shaneWatson, who composed a record-breaking fourth-wicket stand of 194against sri Lanka at the MCG.

Clarke's fifth test ton of the year,the 22nd of his career, propelled him to1,595 runs for the year and fourth onthe all-time list behind MohammadYousuf (1,788), Viv Richards (1,710)and Graeme smith (1,656).

Clarke's selection appeared a gam-ble after he sustained a hamstring in-jury in the first-test victory in Hobart,and pundits complained that it was acase of double standards given injury-free seamer Mitchell starc was left outas part of the team's controversial rota-tion policy. Few would be arguing afterThursday, with Clarke's 14-boundaryknock confounding the sri Lankans formore than four hours and putting Aus-tralia in the box seat to take a winning2-0 series lead before the final test insydney. The 31-year-old's dismissal,slashing a shaminda Eranga delivery tohis counterpart Mahela Jayawardenein the slips, broke his perfect record of

scoring at least a double-century oncehe surpassed 100 in 2012. it alsosparked a mini-collapse as Watson (83)and Matthew Wade (1) fell in quicksuccession to ill-conceived hook-shots,both caught in the deep before tea.

Watson's half-century was his firstin eight innings and a welcome returnto form, but the barrel-chested all-rounder will rue another lost chance toscore his third test century.

Watson had more bad news in storefor him when Cricket Australia said in astatement late on Thursday that he hadsuffered a left calf injury while bowlingon the first day of the match. "He wasable to get though the batting inningstoday and is likely to field on day three,"physiotherapist Alex Kountouris said inthe statement. "Whether he bowls in thesecond innings will be determined closerto the bowling innings." The quick wick-ets gave sri Lanka faint hope of savingthe match but they were plunged backinto the mire with a defiant seventhwicket stand of 61 from middle orderbatsman Mike Hussey and Johnson.

Run machine Clarke heaps misery on Sri Lanka

SRI LanKa fIRSt InnInGS 156aUStRaLIa fIRSt InnInGS (oveRnIGHt) 150-3S. Watson c Samaraweera b prasad 83M. Clarke c M. Jayawardene b eranga 106 M. Hussey b Dilshan c Herath 34M. Wade c eranga b prasad 1M. Johnson not out 73p. Siddle c M. Jayawardene 13n. Lyon not out 0eXtRaS (b-9, lb-5 w-6, nb-2) 22totaL 440StILL to Bat: J. BirdfaLL of WICKetS: 1-95 2-117 3-117 4-311 5-313 6-315 7-3768-434 BoWLInG: C. Welegedara 14.4-6-38-0, S. eranga26.2-2-106-2 (nb-2, w-5), D. prasad 24-2-102-3 (w-1), a.Mathews13-3-47-1, R. Herath 39-7-95-0, t. Dilshan 12-1-38-1

SCoReBoaRD

LAHOREStaff RepoRt

FORMER Pakistan captainsRashid Latif and Moin Khantoday urged the iCC to giveindia-Pakistan series the

iconic status. “The response to this on-going short series and the way the peo-ple followed the first T20 match inBangalore, it is a clear indication thatthe iCC needs to give iconic status toindo-Pak matches,” Latif said.

“The iCC needs to keep a windowopen for indo-Pak series in its FTP withspecial status after taking both Boardsinto confidence. That is the only waycricket relations between Pakistan andindia will not be affected by the politi-cal scenario,” Latif added.

Moin argued that the indo-Pakmatches are bigger than even the tradi-tional Ashes contests.

“The huge interest around theworld when Pakistan and india playagainst each other is enough to con-vince the iCC that iconic status must begiven to such series,” Moin reported tohave said.

Moin said the quality of cricket pro-

duced in indo-Pak matches was alsovery high because players from bothsides put in their best to win matches.

The two former captains also urgedthe Pakistan and indian Boards toschedule a Test series next year.

“Two T20 and three ODi matches isenjoyable but not enough to whet theappetite of cricket fans who want towatch Tests between the two nations,”Moin said.

“i hope that things move on fromthis series and we can have a properTest series soon,” he added.

Latif said there was no better adver-tisement for the sport than a indo-Pakseries.

“Obviously there is lot of pressureinvolved in such matches and at timesit becomes more than a cricket contestbut once we have frequent series thanthese problems will go away,” he said.

He also insisted that the clash be-tween Kamran Akmal and ishantsharma was not unusual in the firstT20 at Bangalore.

“Tempers run high and emotionsare involved when so many people arewatching the match. it is no big deal inmy mind,” he said. Huge number of Fans in Bangalore queued up for tickets to the first India-Pakistan T20 match.

‘Give iconic status toIndia-Pakistan series’

SPORTSDESK

Pakistan wicketkeeper Kamran Akmal andindian pacer ishant sharma, who were finedafter a verbal duel in the first T20 interna-tional at Bangalore, have buried the hatchetand are now the best of friends, according toa leading Pakistani newspaper.

A report said that after the match,sharma had gone to the Pakistan dressingroom and sorted things out with Kamran.“sharma went to the Pakistan dressing roomafter the match and addressing Kamran askedhim Paji Tauno Ki Hogaya see (Brother whathappened to you),” the report said. it said thatsharma had than clarified to Kamran that hehad not used any abusive language againsthim during the standoff in Bangalore. “Afterthat some senior players came in and sortedthings out for both players who have nowburied the incident,” the report said.

The report also said that afterwardswhen the teams travelled on a charteredflight from Bangalore to Ahmedabad, Kam-ran and sharma were seen laughing and ingood spirits. Outside the field, captain Ma-hendra singh Dhoni and Virat Kohli [ im-

ages ] and some of the other indian playersget along well with some of the Pakistaniplayers and some players also had dinner to-gether, the report said.

ishant and Kamran got into the argu-ment when the latter was declared not outafter he was caught off a no ball by the for-mer, and was beaten on the next ball. soonboth the players exchanged a few angrywords and wagged fingers at each other. Fi-nally, the ground umpires and indian play-ers intervened and separated both of them.Pakistan manager, Naved Akram Cheemasaid that despite the incident, the relationbetween the two teams is good and cordial.

“All the intensity is on the field as obvi-ously they also want to win as do we. Butotherwise relations are fine between the twosides and we have been very well lookedafter so far in india,” Cheema said in a TVinterview. He also said that the security forthe Pakistani players had been very goodand they had been very well received andshown hospitality in Bangalore. “The playersare thoroughly enjoying their tour of indiaand the win in the first match has furtherlifted their spirits,” he said.Ishant Sharma gets a friendly pat from Hafeez after a collision during the 1st T20.

Quarrelsome Ishant settles differences with Akmal

LHR 28-12-2012_Layout 1 12/28/2012 5:36 AM Page 16

Sports 16


LAHOREStaff RepoRt

WiTH an intention of host-ing india in August nextyear, the Pakistan CricketBoard has convinced its

West indies counterpart not to split thenational team`s scheduled tour to theCaribbean and instead play a full series inJuly. The sources in the PCB confirmedthat Pakistan will now be travelling to theWest indies in July 2013 to play a full se-ries of two Tests, five ODis and aTwenty20 international.

“The problem is now sorted out andour team will be touring (Windies) in Julyas planned earlier,” a source said. The tourhad ran into trouble when the West indies

cricket board suggested to the PCB to ei-ther postpone the series by a few weeks orto split the tour as they wanted to hostindia and sri Lanka for a short ODi series,also in July. Pakistan will tour West indies

next year to play two tests, five one-day in-ternationals and a Twenty20 match.“There had been a suggestion to split thetour but now it is confirmed for July,” aPakistan Cricket Board official said. Pak-

istan have not played an internationalmatch on home soil since 2009 whenarmed militants attacked sri Lanka's teambus in Lahore. But the PCB insisted on thetour in July as it is planning to convincethe Board of Control for Cricket in india(BCCi) to play a series in August whenboth teams have windows open in the pe-riod in the iCC future tours program.

“Pakistan is very hopeful and keenthat india can be convinced to come toPakistan because india has made it clearit does not have a policy of playing any bi-lateral series in a third country,” thesource said.

He said due to good connections andrelations that the PCB Chairman ZakaAshraf has with the government and au-thorities and because of the confidence re-

posed in him by the board`s chief patron,President Asif Zardari, the board washopeful it could get the government togive an assurance of foolproof security forthe indian team.

“since bilateral ties have resumedafter five years (as india and Pakistan areplaying each other currently in india) andpresently there is lot of positivity in rela-tions between the two boards, there is agood chance that india might listen to thesuggestion of playing in August,” anothersource said. Ashraf is due to leave forindia later this week where he is expectedto have discussions with officials of theBCCi. Pakistan has not hosted any Testside at home since March, 2009 whenmilitants attacked the sri Lanka cricketteam in Lahore.

Team India to tour Pakistan in August?

Stars securefourth straight win

ADELAIDEaGenCIeS

They speak of Twenty20 as a youngman's game, but the evergreen BradHodge, like Ricky Ponting, continues todispel popular opinion. Two days shy ofhis 38th birthday Hodge put on a battingmaster-class, at one of his favourite andmost prolific venues, the Adelaide Oval,to help the Melbourne stars to a crucialwin over the Adelaide strikers. Hodge's88 from 58 balls featured ten fours andthree sixes, but it was the purity of histiming, the stillness of his head, and theartistry of his placement which made itso much more. He spoke in a pre-gameinterview of the importance of a 360-de-gree range of stroke-play for modernbatsmen in T20 cricket, and sure enough,like the old pro he is, he walked out anddelivered what he spoke about. First heswept Johan Botha to the boundary.Then he uppercut shaun Tait fine ofthird man before glancing him wide offine-leg for consecutive fours in the thirdover. He drove elegantly through coverand lofted powerfully over long-on. Hehit Botha miles into the stands to bringup 50 from just 39 balls. The followingover he cut Tait twice, once throughbackward point, the other through cover,both hitting the fence before the bowlerhad completed his short follow-through.Hodge eventually fell to a full toss fromMatt Johnston, which he drilled straightto deep midwicket, but he had alreadytaken ten from the over with a delicatesteer past short third man and a third sixcrushed into the construction site atlong-on. Hodge was supported by smallcameos all the way down the star-stud-ded order, to set an imposing total of 8for 175 after stand-in captain CameronWhite chose to bat first.

Top testscorers in acalendar year

SPORTSDESK

Australia captain Michael Clarke struck106 on Thursday to become his coun-try's highest test run-scorer in a calen-dar year, surpassing Ricky Ponting's1,544 runs set in 2005.HeRe IS a LISt of top 10 BatSMen In tHe WoRLD

WItH MoSt RUnS In a CaLenDaR yeaR:

pLayeR InnInGS RUnS aveRaGe yeaR

M Yousuf 19 1788 99.33 2006

viv Richards 19 1710 90.00 1976

G Smith 25 1656 72.00 2008

M Clarke 18 1595 106.33 2012

Sachin 23 1562 78.10 2010

R Ponting 28 1544 67.13 2005

R Ponting 18 1503 100.20 2003

M vaughan 26 1481 61.70 2002

J Langer 27 1481 54.85 2004

v Sehwag 27 1462 56.23 2008

top 10 aUStRaLIan BatSMen WItH MoSt RUnS In

a CaLenDaR yeaR:

pLayeR InnInGS RUnS aveRaGe yeaR

M Clarke 18 1595 106.33 2012

R Ponting 28 1544 67.13 2005

R Ponting 18 1503 100.20 2003

J Langer 27 1481 54.85 2004

M Hayden 25 1391 63.22 2001

B Simpson 26 1381 60.04 1964

M Hayden 29 1380 53.07 2005

D Martyn 26 1353 56.37 2004

R Ponting 18 1333 88.86 2006

M Hayden 21 1312 77.17 2003

winter MatchPlay Golf trophyfor Faisal

LAHOREStaff RepoRt

The Winter Match Play singles Golf Eventwas held and contested at the Royal PalmGolf Course, with the competition spreadover eight weeks and the participants aregiven the advantage of scheduling theirown competition timings and playingagainst opponents chosen through drawswhich render a player weeded out once heloses to a competitor. And in this competi-tion the golfer who emerged with flyingcolors is Faisal sayid who beat some veryskilled match play experts like Max Babri,Haroon Arshed, Harris Naseer andAsadullah Khan on his way to the final.Reaching the final is certainly a huge ac-complishment as it is made possible by asuperb and consistent application of golf-ing skills involving accurate shot making,decent play around the greens and somewonderful putting which tends to upsetthe competitor. And in all these areasFaisal was not found wanting during hissingles match play competitions. And as ifthis was not enough Faisal duplicated hisexcellence of the earlier matches with agreat performance in the final againstyoung Hussain Hamid who was consid-ered a rather tough opponent but curbedby the steady play of Faisal sayid and yes-terday in the final he lost by a margin oftwo down with one hole to go. Throughthis victory Faisal sayid earned the title ofWinters Match Play Champion.

MARCUS CHAANaGenCIeS

i have a little confession to make. We in thepress box love to label rising stars as 'thenext big thing'. it's not a bad habit. At heart,we are exactly the same as the man on thestreet. Ultimately, we have no say on whatgoes on out on the pitch, or on the court andaround the course. We watch as the fandoes in amazement - sometimes in utterhorror as well - at the spectacle of sport. Ofcourse, we do our utmost best to remain ob-jective and do justice to whichever sport wehave been assigned, but in a lot of wayswe're in the same boat as the fans - we'rehere for whatever ride the athlete takes uson. And in 2012, what a ride Rory Mcilroytook golf on. Many, mostly in the Europeantime zone, have been quick to label Mcilroyas 'the next Tiger Woods'. i hope i can beforgiven if i take a more conservative ap-proach. For me, that's a massive statementto compare Mcilroy to Woods as Tiger is inmy opinion the greatest to have played thegame so far - even if he remains four majorsshort of Jack Nicklaus's 18 titles. Admit-tedly, my dismissal of Nicklaus in favour ofWoods as the most accomplished golfer ofall-time is a bold statement too.

pLayeR aGe yeaR MaJoR

woods 21 1997 Masters

woods 23 1999 uSPGa

woods 24 2000 uS-British open / uSPGa

woods 25 2001 Masters

woods 26 2002 Masters / uS open

woods 29 2005 Masters / British open

woods 30 2006 British open / uSPGa

woods 31 2007 uSPGa

woods 31 2008 uS open

i would think most people would un-derstand my choice of Woods over Nick-laus, even though it's based on gut-feelrather than something much more logicallike maths - the numbers (Nicklaus 18

majors; Woods 14 majors) certainly donot support my pro-Woods argument.And after having said all of that, my nextduty is to declare that it is far too early tosay Mcilroy is 'the next Woods'.pLayeR aGe yeaR MaJoR

Nicklaus 22 1962 uS open

Nicklaus 23 1963 Masters / uSPGa

Nicklaus 25 1965 Masters

Nicklaus 26 1966 Masters / British open

Nicklaus 27 1967 uS open

Nicklaus 30 1970 British open

Nicklaus 31 1971 uSPGa

Nicklaus 32 1972 Masters / uS open

Nicklaus 33 1973 uSPGa

Nicklaus 35 1975 Masters / uSPGa

Nicklaus 38 1978 British open

Nicklaus 40 1980 uS open / uSPGa

Nicklaus 46 1986 Masters

The 23-year-old Northern irishman'snumbers just don't jump out at me in aWoods sort of way, yet. This season, Mcilroywas golf's undisputed world number one ashe won the UsPGA Championship - his sec-ond major - by a runaway eight-shot margin,won four other tournaments and topped themoney lists on both sides of the Atlantic.That's four tournament wins and a major. Abrilliant mark in Mcilroy's rapidly rising ca-reer, but let's be honest that used to be a nor-mal season for Woods. Mcilroy impressedwith his consistency by topping the moneylists on both tours, but he also missed fivecuts this year. it took Woods over a decadeon the PGA Tour before he missed the samenumber of cuts. Yes, Mcilroy brilliant; butnot as close to being on par with Woods atthe moment as some might have you believe. pLayeR aGe yeaR MaJoR

McIlroy 22 2011 uS open

McIlroy 23 2012 uSPGa

in fact, everyone has some way tomatching Woods' best ever season. Thiscame in 2000 when the American won 10 ti-tles including three straight majors.

McIlroy roars but he’s not Tiger yetRory McIlroy conquered the world in 2012, but is he on his way to becoming the next Tiger Woods?

NEW DELHIaGenCIeS

Following india's dismal show in Testsin the last 15 months, the indian selec-tors have put captain Ms Dhoni on no-tice in Tests and have asked him todraw a blueprint to win the 2015 WorldCup. NDTV has learnt that the selectorsexpressed their disappointment toDhoni after the Test loss to England.They have now asked him to draw up ablue print for the 2015 World Cup to beheld in Australia and New Zealand.

Former india captain and NDTV ex-pert sunil Gavaskar, however, was sur-prised by the decision. “i am surprised ifthey have asked him for a blueprint. Firstand foremost the selection's committeetenure is only for a year so there is noguarantee that they will be there to selectthe team for 2015. But it's always good fora selection committee for a frank exchangeand you have to be on the same page.”The selectors have asked Dhoni to identifythe players that he would need in order toperform well in 2015. it's a clear indicationthat while the five wise men have assuredDhoni of ODi captaincy till 2015, theyhave also asked him to pull up his socks.

Mr Gavaskar, however, believes abreak might benefit Dhoni. “While it'searly days as far as 2015 is concerned,may be a break will do wonders forDhoni. i admire the fact that he keeps socool under pressure so Dhoni has hispluses, but the results india is getting,maybe it's time. it might not happenduring the season, it helps for a captainto have a break, whether it's a voulntarybreak or an enforced break. Then he cancome with a difference perspective and

he can comeback as a better captain.”When asked if it was a realistic sugges-tion, Mr Gavaskar said: “There is noth-ing that stops him. His successor mightfind it difficult to cope with the pressureand demands of being the indian cap-tain. it's actually a very funny kind of asituation. People want to be captain butthe demands and the pressure that comewith it are incredible, and sometimes youjust want to say to yourself that 'hang on,i just want to play my own cricket'.”

Meanwhile, Dhoni's Test captaincyis also on tenderhooks. Even thoughODi results and Tests results cannot beequated, sources have told NDTV thatthe decision on whether Dhoni will leadthe Test team against Australia in Feb-ruary will depend heavily on how Teamindia performs in the one-dayersagainst Pakistan and England.

When not the captain, what doesone do with Dhoni? Keep him in theplaying Xi? Mr Gavaskar answers in af-firmative. “i would definitely like tohave Dhoni as a part of playing Xi be-

cause he is a match-winner in the 50overs and the T20 format. Dhoni cer-tainly is an integral part of the indianteam for at least the next couple yearsfor sure, unless his form dips,” he said.

Mr Gavaskar also suggested ViratKohli's name as a worthy successor toDhoni. “My feeling is that Virat Kohli isgoing to bring india the kind of captaincy,the kind of flair, that kind of charisma thatTiger Pataudi had. Once Kohli becomesthe captain on a permanent basis, he isgoing to bring indian cricket the dy-namism and the aggressiveness and theclass that Tiger Pataudi had.” “i don'twant Kohli to change apart from the factthat he abuses once he reaches a land-mark, i do not want him change his ag-gressive nature but i genuinely believethat if he becomes the captain he willbring indian cricket a dimension that willtake indian cricket forward,” he added.While the decision on Dhoni may havebeen put on hold - the fate of indian coachDuncan Fletcher has already been sealed.The BCCi will not renew Fletcher's con-tract. in fact the indian board has alreadystarted looking for options to replaceFlecther in March next year.

And Mr Gavaskar says it might be agood idea to try an indian coach. “Whynot try an indian coach? The indiancoach will understand the indianpysche a lot better. And also otherthings that we need to be remember isindian cricketers will respect an indianwho has achieved things. Look one ofthe reasons why Gary Kirsten was suc-cessful was because he had done it all inboth the Test and the ODi format of thegame. He was somebody one lookedupto as he had done it all.

Dhoni’s Test captaincyunder scanner


Froch readyfor Kessler

SPORTSDESK

Carl Froch has told sky sports Newsthat he is confident of facing and beat-ing Mikkel Kessler in the spring of2013. Britain's iBF super-mid-dleweight world champion lost apoints decision to the Dane in 2010 -just one of two defeats on his record.Kessler won the WBA title from BrianMagee earlier this month and a re-match unification fight between thepair would be a major draw.Froch said: "My promoter Eddie Hearnis working very hard, he is talking toTeam sauerland who are MikkelKessler's promoters and it soundedvery, very promising."They are very close to doing a deal. itlooks like the fight may be done by latespring this year. That is a big, big fightthat everybody wants to see so i amlooking forward to getting it on."The 35-year-old from Nottingham ex-pects to reverse the points decisionthat went against him in Kessler'shome town of Henning in Denmarktwo years ago."it was a close fight that i believe couldhave gone either way," he said. "Any-one you asked would probably agreethat the fight could have been scoredone round within Kessler winning andmyself winning."But that is by the by, Mikkel Kesslerwon fair and square. He was at home,it was in Denmark. so the fight wasclose and he got the nod and that'swhat happens in boxing. if it is close...sometimes the judges give the fight tothe home fighter." Froch believes thatit will be a very different story if thefight takes place in Britain."We are going to get him over to UKsoil. i don't think we'll get him to Not-tingham but we'll get him certainlyover here at home, so that rematch ivery, very strongly believe i can win."i wasn't at my best when i foughtKessler and i am firing on all cylindersnow, you have seen that when i rippedthe world title from Lucien Bute and idefended it against Yusaf Mack with abody shot, folded him in half like adeckchair."And i am looking forward to gettingKessler and being at my best. it isgoing to be a tough fight, a hard fightbetween two warriors, because the firstone was a proper brawl."People are looking forward to the re-match and they want to see much ofthe same. i don't know if i'm lookingforward to the rematch but i can get upfor it, get excited and i know i can goto the well if i need to. if me andKessler go at it for 12 rounds there willonly be one winner. "i strongly believei will defend my title. He has just wonthe WBA title by beating Brian Mageeso i will add another belt to the collec-tion which will be fantastic."As for a rematch against Bute, whomhe beat in May to claim the iBF title,Froch added: "it's a fight that may hap-pen but it's not going to happen imme-diately. The next one is the Kesslerfight, that's for sure."

Sports17


MUMBAIBIpIn DanI

Pakistan's new towering fast bowler, Mo-hammad irfan has been advised to workhard and concentrate on his skill by formerWest indian fast bowler, Joel Garner, alsoknown as "Big Joel" or "Big Bird" becauseof his 6'-8" height. speaking exclusivelyover telephone from Barbados, Garner,who turned 61 earlier this month, said:"Though i have not seen him (irfan) bowl-ing, my message to him would be to workhard and utilise his skill in the matches. Hehas to do a lot of practice in the nets and be-come utility bowler for his country".

irfan made his Twenty20 debutagainst india on Tuesday.

if irfan's controversial height issue iskept aside as Will Jefferson at 6'-9 1/2" isthe tallest recorded cricketer to have played(for Essex and Nottinghamshire counties)the game at the First Class level.

speaking from London, where he wascelebrating the X'mas holidays with hisfamily, he said: "it is more advantageous tobe a tall bowler i think. The extra bounceyou can extract from the wicket from beingtall is a big advantage-just look at stephenFinn. But there are many advantages tobeing tall when you bat as well. Having longlevers is only good if you can make the mostof them. Tall batsmen need to still be able

to keep their head and eyes level and flextheir knees to help them move quickly intogood batting positions".

Jefferson played with some great Pak-istani cricketers over the years, Abdul Raz-zak recently and Danish Kaneria at Essex.He also faced Wasim Akram and WaqarYounis on a tour of England in 2000.

"i enjoyed fielding in the slips in my ca-reer and being tall was a huge help in thisposition. But you need to practice keepinglow a lot of the time and not coming up tooearly. Being tall you can reach balls havinglong arms that other. shorter players can-not reach", he added. "Also, when you are

tall, it is important to get you in the rightpositions on the pitch during one day and20/20 games. Long off and Long on aregood to try and catch balls that might begoing for six into the crowd! And cover andmid wicket when the spin bowlers are on inone day cricket as you are in the batsmen'seye line and they might be concerned abouttrying to get the ball over you".

"My message to Mr irfan would be towork hard on his footwork and his coremuscles, and also his diving and slidingtechnique as cricket now expects everyoneto be an athletic fielder, no matter what sizeor shape you are". "My height might haveheld me back from playing internationalcricket as my chance came and went in2004/05 when i was at my peak. i workedincredibly hard at my fitness and have fin-ished my career with no regrets-only a badback and hip! Being tall does put morestresses and strains on your body so oneword of advice would be to look after yourbody for the long term-not just the shortterm of playing the game", he added fur-ther. stating about his family history, headded, "My father, Richard Jeffersonplayed for surrey in the early 1960's andwas a very tall fast medium bowler whocould bat. He was 6"7 inches tall. i have atall brother and two tall sisters as well, andalready my nieces and nephews are lookinglike they are going to be tall as well".

garner asks Irfan to protecthis body for lasting results

SPORTSDESK

Maria sharapova and serenaWilliams will be fit to play at theBrisbane international, which be-gins this weekend, after injuryscares, organisers said on Thurs-day.

French Open championsharapova pulled out of an exhi-bition match against CarolineWozniacki scheduled for Friday inseoul because of a sore collar-bone.

But the Russian, along withWilliams one of the biggest drawsin women's tennis, is due to arrivefor the Dec. 30-Jan. 6 tournamenton saturday.

sharapova withdrew from theAustralian Open warm-up eventlast year.

Williams, who won a fifthWimbledon title, Olympic singles

gold and a fourth U.s. Opencrown in 2012, also pulled out ofan exhibition against China's LiNa in Thailand last week.

However, the American hasbeen given the green light to par-ticipate in Brisbane following toesurgery.

"it's great that they're bothgoing to be fit to play the firsttournament of the year," tourna-ment organiser Cameron Pearsontold Australian media.

Eight of the world's top 10women are scheduled to play inthe $1.5 million Brisbane event,including number one VictoriaAzarenka of Belarus.

Azarenka and sharapova willboth receive first-round byes, asdo the top four seeds in the men'sdraw, headed by Britain'sOlympic and U.s. Open championAndy Murray.

Sharapova, Williams set to be fit for Brisbane

almagro takesNadal’s spot

SPORTSDESK

Nicolas Almagro will replace RafaelNadal in the field for this week'sMubadala World Tennis Championshipexhibition event. The world number 11has agreed to fill in for Nadal, who hasbeen ruled out of the Abu Dhabi eventdue to a stomach virus. Almagro takesNadal's place in the draw, meaning hisfirst match will be a semi-final on Friday(December 28) against either Andy Mur-ray or Janko Tipsarevic. Almagro said:"No matter where, when or who i play, iplay to win and that will be my approachcome match time whether it's Murray orTipsarevic. They are both tremendousplayers and i will need to be at my best."He added: "This championship hasgained the reputation of being one of theelite events in the region and i am ex-cited to be able to join such a great groupof players here in Abu Dhabi. This al-ready has the feel of a Grand slam quar-ter-final and will be great preparation forthe upcoming season." World numberone Novak Djokovic heads the field inAbu Dhabi, where he is the defendingchampion. He will face either David Fer-rer or Tomas Berdych in the other semi-

final. Thefirstroundmatchesof the new

season'sopeningevent takeplace onThurs-day.


32nD national games

Sports 18


watch it LiveESPNSports Center07:30PM

OLD TRAFFORDaGenCIeS

Manchester United manager sir Alex Fergu-son will not face punishment for confrontingreferee Mike Dean at Old Trafford, the Foot-ball Association has confirmed. The scotwas furious after Dean overruled assistantJake Collin and awarded Newcastle's secondgoal in the Red Devils' 4-3 win.

The FA confirmed no action would betaken against the Red Devils boss as Deanmade no reference to Ferguson confrontinghim in his report. Ferguson approachedDean as he made his way out for the secondhalf, before rounding on the fourth officialNeil swarbrick and Collin. Dean did notsend Ferguson off during the match, whichended with United going seven points clearat the top of the Premier League thanks totheir win and Manchester City's 1-0 defeatat sunderland. Ferguson was furious that

Dean allowed a Jonny Evans own goal tostand after Collin had flagged for offsideagainst Newcastle striker Papiss Cisse.

Ferguson said: "The referee changed thelinesman's mind. "He said it was an owngoal. But if you see it again, and the refereecan't, the guy is in an offside position, thenhe pulls Evans' arm. "if that is not interfer-ing, what is? i think it was a bad decision."

The Premier League issued a clarifica-tion, backing Dean's decision, confirmingthat "as Cisse did not play the ball, then hewas not interfering with play". The leaguealso stated that: "it is also the case that Cissedidn't interfere with the opponent.'' JavierHernandez's 90th-minute winner gaveUnited the spoils as they fought back threetimes from a goal down to edge out Newcas-tle in an enthralling encounter.HeRnanDez HeROICS DOWnneWCaSTLe: Manchester Unitedtrailed three times but eventually prevailed

4-3 against Newcastle Javier Hernandezsnatched victory for Manchester United ina pulsating and controversial 4-3 PremierLeague victory over Newcastle at Old Traf-ford in which Alan Pardew's side led onthree occasions. The Red Devils lookedas though they would have to settlefor a point at best but struck at thestart of added time as the Mexicostriker applied the finishing touch toJonny Evans' cross to spark jubila-tion from a previously furious sirAlex Ferguson as his side movedseven points clear of Manches-ter City following their shock1-0 defeat at sunderland.Newcastle made a dreamstart as they were giftedthe lead with only fourminutes on the clock.Michael Carrick failedto control the ball in

midfield with Demba Ba advancing to-wards the United box before unleashing alow shot which David De Gea could onlypush into the path of the grateful James

Perch to tap home. Unitedwere back on terms in the25th minute when Evans ap-

plied the finishing touch atthe right end from close

range after Tim Krulcould only half blockJavier Hernandez's

low shot following aVan Persie free-kick

which causedconfusion inthe visiting de-fence. But the

moment of con-troversy arrived

soon after withDanny simpson's

low shot from the right corner of boxturned home by sliding Evans. Assistantreferee Jake Collin's flag went up for off-side against Cisse, but Dean eventuallygave the goal as he correctly ruled the New-castle striker had not touched the ball.

it was the right decision from the of-ficial, but sparked fury among the homeplayers and supporters, while Fergusonsat with a face like thunder in the OldTrafford dug-out, chewing furiously inthe pouring rain, with his stewing angerunleashed as the teams emerged at thestart of the second half, an incident theFootball Association are sure to take aninterest in. Newcastle were inches awayfrom taking a 3-1 lead before the intervalas sylvain Marveaux picked himself upafter having his heels clipped by Hernan-dez outside the box to curl a glorious free-kick against the face of the crossbar withDe Gea rooted to his line.

Liverpool needto find ‘winningmentality’: enrique

LONDONaGenCIeS

Liverpool defender Jose Enrique admitsthe side need to have more self-belief ifthey are to push for a top four berth thisseason after their 3-1 defeat at stoke Cityon Wednesday. The loss followed theirimpressive 4-0 win over Fulham at theweekend and left Liverpool in 10th, eightpoints behind fourth-placed TottenhamHotspur. spain's Enrique, who joinedfrom Newcastle United in 2011, said hethought Liverpool would win when theytook the lead through a steven Gerrardpenalty after two minutes but the visitors'advantage lasted just three minutes.

Mancini blasts Cityfor being ‘too soft’

SPORTSDESK

Roberto Mancini accused his ManchesterCity players of being soft after seeingthem slip seven points behind Manches-ter United with defeat at "lucky" sunder-land. City went down by the only goal forthe third successive season at the sta-dium of Light, while their neighbourscame from behind three times to defeatNewcastle 4-3 at Old Trafford to extendtheir lead at the top. Mancini insisted hismen had only themselves to blame afternot making the most of the chances theycreated before succumbing to formerteam-mate Adam Johnson's 53rd-minutestrike. Mancini said: "We deserved to winthis game. We had a lot of chances, weplayed well, but we didn't score. "This isour problem, we don't score, we don'tscore enough goals to win the game."Last year, we scored one, two, threegoals every game. Now when we havechances, we are too soft and this is notgood. "We are too soft in attack, too softwhen we have chances, too soft when weshoot. sometimes we don't shoot, wewant to have one touch more. This is notgood." Defeat at sunderland, coupledwith United's home victory over Newcas-tle, saw sir Alex Ferguson's men reachthe halfway stage of the Premier Leagueseason with a commanding lead, but onethe italian is confident is far from deci-sive. He said after the 1-0 loss: "it hasn'tchanged. At this mo-ment, United are bet-ter than us, they areat the top, but wehave time to re-cover. "We need toresolve our prob-lems before andafter, maybe we canwin. it's no prob-lem, sevenpoints.

Ferguson to escape FA action over row

LaHoRe: Players contest

with zeal and spirit in

various events of 32nd

National Games regardless

of controversies surrounding

the event. MurTAzA ALI

LAHORE Staff RepoRt

WAPDA, in the absence offorces teams of Army,Navy and Air Force, hasturned out to be a force

to reckon with as the other participantsof the 32nd National Games seemedmare minnows in the race for the Quaid-i-Azam Trophy.

On three six of the Games WAPDAoutclassed rest of the teams in the medalrace notching up 146 plus gold medals.

On the sixth day of the Games,WAPDA was enjoying top slot with 146gold medals, 42 silver and 25 bronze,HEC stood second with 18 gold medals,39 silver, and 55 bronze while Punjabgrabbed the third position by getting 3more gold medals making it 16 goldmedals, 26 silver, 30 brozne. sindh wentdown to fourth position with 13 gold, 19silver and 10 bronze medals.

The wrestling event saw total domi-nation of WAPDA which grabbed all theseven gold medals and left other teamsto win just silver and bronze medals.Railways bagged second position withthree silver medals and three bronzewhile Punjab stood third with three sil-

ver medals. in 55kg weight category,Papu of WAPDA won gold medal, MBilal silver and M Rashid bronzewhile in 60kg weight category,Bashrat Ali of WAPDA secured goldmedal, Abdul Wahab silver andFaisal bronze. The 66kg event sawM sulaiman of WAPDA winninggold, Qamar Abbas of Punjab sil-ver and Haseeb Khan of islam-abad bronze while the 74kgweight category gold went to MAsad of WAPDA, silver to MAzhar of Railways, bronze toAmir Javed of HEC. The 84kgweight category goldmedal was won M Umairof WAPDA, silver byYasir Abbas of Rail-ways and bronze bysafi Ullah of islam-abad while 96kg goldwas won by M inam ofWAPDA, Bilal Hus-sain of Railways andbronze by MujeebUllah of KPK. UsmanMajeed of WAPDA securedgold medal, shah Zaman of Po-lice and ibrahim of HEC bronze.

The ju-jitsu event was held at AiMC

Lahore. in 56kg men ju-jitsu fightingevent, gold went to Ghulam Farid of

WAPDA, silver to Khayal Muhammadof KPK and bronze to Ameer Huza-ifa of sindh. The 49kg women ju-

jitsu fighting gold was won byZoya Ranjha of WAPDA, silver by

saba salamat of Punjab andbronze by Eman Riaz of sindh.

The duo system men gold went toWaheed ud Din and shahzebNawaz of HEC, silver to AmeerHuzaifa and Hasnain Ahmed ofsindh and bronze KhayalMuhammad and Mir Khan of

KPK. in 60kg weight cate-gory, WAPDA’s RanaAdnan bagged gold,HEC’s siddique Akbarsilver and KPK’s KhayalMuhammad bronze.The 66kg event goldwent to WAPDA’sJaved, silver to HEC’sAmeer shahzad andbronze to Police’s shar-

jeel. The 73kg event goldwas lifted by WAPDA’s M

Umair, silver by HEC’s Farhanand bronze by Fata’s Gul Afridi. The85kg gold was won by WAPDA’s Kara-

mat, silver by Police’s shafiq and bronzeby Punjab’s Bilawal. in female ju-jitsu48kg event, gold was clinched byWAPDA’s Zoya Ranjha, silver by KPK’sKausar iqbal and bronze by sindh’s israWaseem. in men football event, WAPDAcrushed Police to earn gold medal whilePunjab won its match for the bronzemedal. in taekwondo event, WAPDAwon overall nine gold medals, seven sil-ver medals and two bronze medals, Rail-ways bagged nine gold medals, twosilver and nine bronze while HEC tooktwo gold, eight silver and nine bronzemedals.

Athletics event was also dominatedby WAPDA as its players clinched max-imum number of gold medals.

in shooting individual event, Uroojof WAPDA scored 519 to win gold, Ghaz-ala of HEC scored 471 for silver andsadaf of HEC scored 377 for bronze. inthe standard pistol individual event, MAbbas of WAPDA scored 537 points toclaim gold while Tariq Manzoor of FRAscored 533 for silver and Zahid ofWAPDA 516 for bronze. in team event,WAPDA notched up gold medal with1,516 points while FRA won silver with1,468 points and HEC got bronze with1432 points.

With Army absent, WAPDAbecome a force to reckon with


Friday, 28 December, 2012Published by Arif Nizami at Qandeel Printing Press, 4 Queens Road, Lahore. Editor: Arif Nizami

MONITORING DESK

THE banned Tehreek-e-TalibanPakistan (TTP) – in a letter to ananchor of a private TV channel –has made a conditional ceasefire

offer to the government. The letter envisages an end to Pakistan’sparticipation in the Afghan war and thereshaping of the constitution and foreignpolicy according to the holy Quran andsunnah. The letter was sent by PunjabTTP chief Asmatullah Muawiya and wasendorsed by TTP spokesman EhsanullahEhsan in a telephonic call from anunidentified place.The letter calls for repeal of all laws whichare repugnant to islam and says theconstitution should be re-written in thelight of the holy Quran and sunnah.Ehsan in his telephonic message saidthe letter had the full backing of theTTP and it should be considered astheir stance.The letter reads further the TTP wasdragged into a war with Pakistan fromAfghanistan and Kashmir fronts and thegovernment and the army wereresponsible for this.The war with the TTP was started by thearmy and they are only defendingthemselves which is their religious right,the TTP letter reads.it reads further any religious scholarwould confirm that the defence of dignity,self-respect, life, property and faith wasthe right of every Muslim and fighting forthis right is called Jihad.

The TTP spokesman said the PakistanArmy should become a “pure islamicarmy” and not act as a mercenary forAmerica.“instead of taking out guns againstMuslims (Ahle islam), the Pakistan Armyshould prepare to take revenge for the1971 war (with india). This will also addthe potential of Kashmiri mujahideen toour forces,” the TTP said.The TTP letter revealed that it was nottargeting the Jamaat-e-islami and JUi-Fazl, but these parties should also revisetheir positions and statements.it said the TTP had taken a “quietapproach” towards the PML-N andTehreek-e-insaf, but the ANP had solditself for the glitter of American dollars.The MQM, the letter claimed, had alsoadopted a similar position.“if the ANP changes its policies andapologises for its past mistakes, the TTPis prepared to forgive them,” the TTPstatement said.The letter read Pakistan was their countryand “we love its streets and even plainsand deserts but we cannot sacrifice ourfaith for this love”.The TTP letter read further any freshoperation in North Waziristan would be afailure as America with its 42 allies hasnot been able to achieve any success. “if we are attacked even those who arenow away from the fighting will take uparms and many more fronts will open,”the TTP said. The TTP said now thegovernment should decide what itwanted to do.

GARHI KHUDA BUKHSH Inp

interior Minister Rehman Malik onThursday claimed to make importantrevelations about murder of PPPchairwoman Benazir Bhutto in theparty’s Central Executive Committee(CEC) meeting.Talking to reporters, Malikchallenged banned Tehreek-e-Taliban(TTP) chief Hakeemullah Mehsud tocome to the front instead of issuingstatements through his spokesmanAhsanullah Ahsan.Earlier, upon his arrival at sukkurAirport, the interior minister toldreporters that he had asked AfghanPresident Hamid Karzai to hand overTTP militants Fazlullah andAsmatullah Muawiya.He said that Muawiya should avoidguiding the Pakistani governmentthrough letters.Malik claimed that all terrorists workingon foreign agenda would be soonbrought to book.He said that the PPP leadership knowsbetter about deploying any worker oncertain slot and it does not need advicein this regard.Later, the interior minister alsovisited the mausoleum of BenazirBhutto and prayed.

GARHI KHUDA BUKHSHaGenCIeS

Prime Minister (PM) Raja Pervez Ashrafon Thursday said Bilawal Bhutto Zardariwas ready to take charge of PakistanPeople’s Party (PPP).

speaking to reporters on the fifthdeath anniversary of Benazir Bhutto, thePM said Bilawal will be carrying theflame lit by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, whichhad been preserved by Benazir Bhutto.

Ashraf said Bilawal will lead the car-

avan of democracy and reinvigorate thePPP workers. He said those who hadgathered at Garhi Khuda Bakhsh trustedPPP and had faith in shaheed Zulfikar AliBhutto’s and Benazir Bhutto’s mission.

“Today the the image of shaheed Zul-fikar Ali Bhutto and shaheed Mohtarma Be-nazir Bhutto and training of President AsifAli Zardari will appear before the masses inthe person of Bilawal Bhutto Zardari,” saidthe PM. Ashraf expressed his confidence inBilawal’s leadership saying that he was ca-pable to lead the party and the nation.

Malik to reveal classifiedinfo about BB murder

Taliban set termsto ceasefire

‘Bilawal ready to take charge of PPP’

g Taliban letter calls for repeal of laws repugnantto Islam g TTP spokesman says Pakistan Armyshould become ‘pure Islamic army’

Pakistan beat Indiato clinch AsianChampions Trophy

MONITORING DESK

Pakistan defeated india 5-4in an exciting Asian HockeyChampions Trophy final atthe Al Rayyan stadium inDoha, Qatar on Thursday toclinch the gold medal. itwas a close match, marredby controversy in the finalfew minutes, with indiawalking off the field inprotest against a penaltycorner that was not given.They came back on withtwo minutes left in thematch as Pakistan held onto secure the win.

KOHATaGenCIeS

Terrorists on Thursday attacked securitycheck posts in FR Peshawar, killing at leasttwo levies forces personnel and injuringanother.According to sources, the terroristsattacked check posts in Jani Khawra, Zarkaand Zakhai. The militants also kidnapped

33 personnel.Officials said that dozens of militantsarmed with rocket-propelled grenades andautomatic weapons attacked two checkposts, killing two policemen.The officials say security forces havelaunched an operation to try to recover themissing policemen. They spoke oncondition of anonymity because they werenot authorised to talk to the media.

PPP CEC MEETING

Two Levies officialskilled in FR PeshawarBenazir’s killer

died in drone attack: kairaLaRKana: information MinisterQamar Zaman Kaira on Thursdaysaid one of Benazir Bhutto’ssuspected killers was killed in adrone strike while the remainingaccused languished in jails. He saidthe government wanted to solve thecountry’s problems throughdialogues. Earlier, on Wednesday,the federal minister said December27 would be an important day for theparty and the country as anotherBhutto would be starting his politicalcareer. He said the journey started bythe late Zulfikar Ali Bhutto andcontinued by Benazir Bhutto forstrengthening the country facedcrises and problems and requiredseveral sacrifices. He said Zulfikar AliBhutto had begun the journey bygiving a new philosophy to Pakistan.Benazir Bhutto, he said, had alsogiven her vision and now BilawalBhutto would announce his vision asthe third generation of the familysteps into national politics. aGenCIeS

PPP Chairman Bilawal

Bhutto Zardari’s Thursday

speech was not only full of

substance, he showed re-

markable oratory skills and quite a

familiarity with the national lan-

guage, Urdu.

Bilawal hardly used english words

during his speech, a fact that sur-

prised many.

his Urdu accent reminded many of

his late mother, a reminder that on

numerous instances brought tears

to President Asif Ali Zardari’s eyes.

When asked about Bilawal’s oratory

and accent, Zardari said he never

trained the young party chief.

Bilawal’s maternal aunt, Sanam

Bhutto was also seen in tears with

Zardari, who both said the young

Bhutto reminded them of his late

mother.

The anniversary gathering wit-

nessed an attendance of hundreds

of thousands, due to the event

falling much close to the

upcoming election.

19


e-paper pakistantoday 28th December, 2012

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