Verbose failure
Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh, the fourth finance minister of the present regime, resigned from his post on February 19. He remained the finance minister for almost three years and presented…
Our founders and guardians
A fellow-columnist has asked why “if we had to go through this (the mess that Pakistan has become today) did we go through the trouble of Partition?” (February 22). Let’s…
Not a perfect world
TheIran-Pakistan pipeline is back in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Islamabad and Tehran have signed an agreement to press ahead with the project and Tadbir Energy has offered…
Hope on the wane
Tragic as the recent loss of soldiers on both sides of the Line of Control (LoC) is, the other significant casualty has been plummeting public confidence in the ability of…
Has reconciliation been advanced?
The trilateral summit hosted in London by Prime Minister David Cameron, judging by the joint statement his office released, has been an outstanding success. Pakistan and Afghanistan have agreed on…
The original sin of Shahrukh Khan
Now what was Shahrukh Khan thinking when he did that article for Outlook? If anyone in the Mumbai film industry knows how to engage the media and use it to…
Pakistan`s triple front
Pakistan is at another inflexion point in its eventful history. It confronts strategic challenges simultaneously on three fronts: internal, western and eastern. The internal challenge is most palpable: economic stagnation;…
The care they can take
The constitution is silent on the precise role of the caretaker government. There is a general agreement that the caretaker setup should not take any action that favors one political…
The unsung hero of Kargil
“Gentlemen! Thank you very much for gracing our Independence Day”. That is how President Bill Clinton greeted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his team at Blair House, the US Presidential…
Sordid story of tax frauds – III
During 2003-2007, one tax official used different techniques to issue illegal refunds in several cases without any check by any agency. It was found that the accused official during his…
