Policy before transport
The Punjab government says that the metro bus project has been completed at a cost of nearly Rs30 billion. By the time all the invoices are in, the final figure…
The Supreme Court debate
The emergence of a powerful Supreme Court of Pakistan has given rise to a continuing critical debate about the Supreme Court’s functioning and its various judgments. Questions have arisen: is…
Sectarian threat to polls
The brutal killing of a leading lawyer in Peshawar last Friday, apparently for his belief, should awaken everyone who wields any authority in Pakistan to the dangerous consequences of the…
Laundering one’s sins
Had our politicians been like their Indian counterparts, they would have taken a dip in the waters at Attock (the confluence of the rivers Indus and Kabul) or at Panjnad…
Soptlight: Donkey years? No, much worse!
In business concerns, whether industries or commercial enterprises, there is a two-word term used to describe an employee's experience whose length does not have much to show by way of…
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…
The yell for democracy
Democracy has to be saved and that is the clarion call from the various TV channels. What is the motivation for all this shouting? Winston Churchill (WC) did say that…
The extent of cooperation
Some days before CIA chief John Brennan’s confirmation hearings, the Open Society Justice Initiative released a report saying that 54 countries around the world aided the Central Intelligence Agency in…
Manufacture of the militant discourse
Following an embedded visit to the terrorism-hit Waziristan last December, an Islamabad-based journalist broke a story about cracks appearing in the leadership of the outlawed Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Claiming an…
Endemic corruption
Pakistan is going through an immensely difficult era. Is it because of democracy? Is it because of the legacy that Musharraf left behind? Whatever the diagnosis the fact is that…
