| August 11, 2007 | Saturday | Rajab 26, 1428 |
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Unfair criticism
Prize Bond scheme
Online ticketing
NIP
The Frontier Crimes Regulation
Computerised tax payment receipt
Repairs needed
First fix the projects
Disappointing postal service
Pakistan cricket
CNG buses
Readers are requested to restrict their comments to a maximum of 400 words. We reserve the right to edit letters for reasons of clarity and space. Letters, including those by e-mail, should carry the complete postal address of the sender. The views expressed in these columns do not necessarily reflect the views of the newspaper.—Editor
THE nation breathed a sigh of relief on hearing the news that emergency is not being imposed.
The national press is doing well to expose the latest faux pas of the rulers, which are being committed with remarkable regularity.
May I also take this opportunity to thank Ms. Condoleezza Rice for her intervention which brought the rulers to their senses and saved the masses from even greater unrest as compared to what we have witnessed for most part of this year.
The fact is that the popularity of the present government, President included, is at its lowest ebb. The nation is already fed up with relentless load-shedding and persistent inflation.
Law and order situation has never been worse and the future looks bleak as no worthwhile infrastructure development measures have been initiated to improve the lot of the masses (this is with particular reference to provision of cheap electricity through utilisation of the vast hydroelectric potential).
On top of it the superior courts are exposing one folly of the government after another. The latest being NAB’s report regarding involvement of several sitting bigwigs of the government in the sugar scandal.
What can one expect from a government whose members benefit from sufferings of the common people? All of you please go home and leave us alone.
PIR SHABBIR AHMAD
Islamabad
CAPITAL markets play an important role in boosting the overall economy of any country; they help to mobilize resources for the government and for the corporate sector.
The nature of these markets is highly sensitive and they react very rapidly to any new either positive or negative.
Karachi Stock Exchange is a market worth 60 billion USD. It is attractive to foreign buyers and the average daily turnover is 500 M shares, besides these facts this markets moves the other two exchanges of the country i.e. Lahore and Islamabad Exchange.
Unfortunately, because of the news circulating from 8 August about imposing of emergency in the country, the KSE index plunged to the intraday low at 600 points and closed at a decent low level.
I think there should have been a certain level of responsibility from the high ups, to safe guard the interest of both local and foreign investors.
SAMIR AMIN SHIWANI
Karachi
THE attempt to impose a state of emergency in a country that is so far thankfully at peace was nothing more than a last ditch attempt by a failed ruler to re gain control.
The time has come for the silent majority of moderates to raise their voice against this disguised dictatorship and reject this fascism. Let Pakistan regain its lost glory and respect, and let us fight for our right to rule. Let us at least reject this imposition of emergency and demand that the general elections be held as scheduled.
OMAR B. MANIAR
Karachi
S.A. Quershi’s op-ed is not only unfair toward Imran Khan and others of his ilk, it is excessively favourable to, and overly forgiving of, Benazir Bhutto and her socialist ideology. Mr Qureshi is also off the mark in equating Menshevik policies with Imran Khan’s. There are no Trotskys, Lenins, or Stalins amongst Islamists and Pakistan is not post-imperial Russia.
Also, Imran is no Islamist in secular clothing and to imply otherwise is disingenuous. Imran has made clear that he does not mix his religion with his politics by arguing in secular terms for the cause of democracy.
The fact that he does not subscribe to the anti-religion paranoia of socialists everywhere (Turkey and France come to mind here) does not make him an unwitting partner to jihadi lunacy.
The very fact that Mr Qureshi alludes to a foreign land and people and not, say, Mughal or even Ottoman history in framing his argument speaks volumes about how utterly slavish, and disastrously ignorant of the historical forces that shape today’s Muslim world, our self-styled liberals remain.
Understandably, Imran wants to move toward real solutions, not fantastic concoctions that smell like diversionary tactics from the army’s playbook.
Favouring Ms Bhutto and the PPP as they enact the same pact-with-the-devil that Islamists enacted to gain disproportionate power is a betrayal of democracy, a pathetic admission that our domestic space will continue to remain totally beholden to the military.
Islamism is a disease of spiritual bankruptcy whose anecdote can never be an ideology rooted in materialism.
As such, socialism and Islamism are two sides of the same Marxist coin.
Yet, secular politics and their free economies have co-existed and thrived in the past with classical, spiritually vibrant Islam. Let’s hope the powers that be are not too religion-allergic to be paying attention
ZAHEER AKMAL
Houston, Texas, USA
PRIZE Bond’s scheme is the only lawful source for poor and middle class people to become rich overnight and making their dreams come true but this scheme has been ignored awfully.
Recently, profit rates on five savings schemes, namely Defense Saving Schemes (DSS), Regular Income Certificates (RIC), Behbood Savings Certificates (BSC), Savings Accounts (SA) and Special Savings Certificates (SSC) have been increased by 8 to 50 basic points but Prize Bond Scheme was not given consideration at all.
Tragically, the increase of profit rates on these above schemes will not lessen dues burden of Rs150 billion or more on account of Defense Savings Certificates maturing in the near future. Prize Bonds’ scheme is the only rescuer in this regard, provided the following suggestions are duly implemented:
a. Secondary Market of Prize Bond should be regularized by issuing licenses to Prize Bond’s dealers. By regularizing the Secondary Market for Prize Bonds, huge funds can be generated and Government can be in a right position to generate the desired funds in the local currency as well as in foreign currency at the cheapest cost and at the same time, can collect more revenues in the form of license fees and income tax every year.
b. Withholding period of 60 days prior issuance of Prize Bond to the draw date should be reduced to 30 days (as was earlier), so that the Prize Bonds holders get more incentives.
c. By increasing overall returns on Prize Bond Scheme at par with other schemes. Moreover, number of Small Prizes should be increased by decreasing Big Prizes in the same proportionate. It will create more chances of winning the prizes thus utmost magnetism is produced towards the Scheme.
d. By reintroducing the facility of “Power of Attorney”. Earlier, overseas Pakistanis, housewives, sick & old people, special persons and children etc. had this facility through which they could get their prize bonds claimed being at their own places but since they are compelled owing to their own mobility reasons, they are quite worried about the unclaimed Prize Bonds they have. This decision has led to make these segments putting their hands off the Prize Bond Scheme completely which has given a great loss to exchequer ultimately since these segments are in large numbers.
e. By taking back withholding tax @ 10% on prizes with immediate effect which is also a cause of great concern among winners of prize bonds.
By implementing aforementioned suggestions, I am sure that the Government will be in a better position to get funds at the cheapest cost as much as they need and thus Government’s dependence on outside financial agencies will tremendously be reduced and it will ensure following an anti-inflationary policy in the long run.
DR SAIRA BANO
General Secretary For Ko-Ordination Group
— KRG Karachi
WITH improved IT services across the board, airlines have also started issuing online reservations and even seat allocations. Credit Cards are used to purchase and subsequently print online tickets. It is an extremely convenient alternative to going to a travel agent and all the hassles associated.
However, having said that, I want to understand the rationale behind not allowing even the immediate family members to travel unless the card holder is accompanying them.
My family was to travel to Lahore from Dubai. I traveled by road form Al Ain to Dubai airport and accompanied my family right up to the check-in desk. I proved my identity and expressed “no objection (signing the ticket in front of airline staff)” on their traveling by tickets issued on my credit card payment. But we were turned back sighting a note on the ticket saying card holder has to be a passenger. Legally speaking the staff was correct; questionable logically though. Therefore, my family missed that flight and we were declared “no show” thus causing additional financial penalty. We had to travel back to Al Ain. I had to pay a handsome amount to make my unaccompanied family legal travelers.
If the restriction is imposed to prevent fraudulent misuse of credit cards then I and my family shouldn’t have gone through the torture we were subjected to in foreign land as I had provided all the evidence of fair game.
If the restriction is to discourage the very use of credit card (despite charging bank processing fee) thus forcing a traveler visit a travel agent to justify "Sale Agent" permit, then it would amount to unfairness.
I am certain my concerns will fall on deaf ears as there is no competition and accountability.
MASROOR UL HASAN
Al Ain, UAE
THE National Internship Programme (NIP) was launched by the government with the slogan that every youth who earned a fresh degree will be provided an opportunity to get one year professional experience. When the advertisement was aired, I kept trying to register online, but unfortunately the system did not registering applications even after one week. Eventually I managed to register.
But after a long delay i.e. after the inauguration of NIP in many cities and then Lahore, when I tried to look into my account, I was totally shocked to discover that my entry was not included in that system. Then I tried to log in through an auto-generated mail query but again it did not recognise me.
I am not alone in waiting for a call; others may not even know that their names have been deleted from the system.
JAHANGIR
Lahore
PRESIDENT Musharaf, while once commenting on the status of FCR has said that the government would soon bring major changes/amendments to the Frontier Crimes Regulation. On the other hand, a few days latter, he said that the powers of the political agent must be increased to deter the law and order situation of the tribal areas.
Such dualism on the part of the head of the state shows non seriousness of the government to the ills and problems of tribal people.
The Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR) is a set of special laws introduced by the British colonialists in the tribal areas way back in year 1871 AD. With the passage of time the regulation was found to be inadequate. The inadequacy was removed by amending and re-enacting the laws in 1873 and 1876. New acts and offences were added to the FCR in 1901.
Widening the scope of the regulation; it consists of six chapters, 64 sections and 3 schedules. British said such tough laws were needed to stem the crimes in the tribal belt, but in fact a hidden agenda was behind the action, through these laws they wanted to restrict the social, political and economic life of the tribal people by bringing them under tight control.
The section 22 and 23 of the FCR territorial responsibility and collective punishments could not be imagined in a civilized society.
All over the world governments are responsible for the safety of their citizens, but in FATA the inhabitants are responsible for the safety of the government.
Despite the fact that most of the sections of the FCR clash with the basic principles of justice, fundamental, constitutional rights of the tribal people and international laws the oppressive regulation continues to remain in force even after 60 years of independence. In modern times, a civilized society cannot think of such draconian laws that have badly affected the tribal people in the past and continue to have very negative implications for their socio –political and economic development.
The superior judiciary of Pakistan, including the federal Shariat court has made categorical judgments against the FCR and has recommended its repeal. But the corrupt bureaucracy/administration in the tribal areas had been claiming that the situation was not ripe for reforms in FATA. The insiders of the people of these areas wanted to repeal the law and if not to reform where as the outsiders the administration were totally against it for their vested interests.
Geographical importance, social and economic backwardness, political deprivation and present geo political situation of the area call for concrete and urgent steps for undoing the wrongs done to the tribal population over a century.
Granting political rights and freedom to the tribal people by extending the political parties act to the areas, making local government system truly representative by electing the agency councils on the basis of the adult franchise, ensuring inexpensive and expeditious justice system by brining the tribal areas under jurisdiction of the superior courts, and putting an end to social under development with the extension of social welfare act to FATA are some of the direly needed steps to abolish the oppressive system in the tribal area developed through an equally oppressive FCR.
Failure to act would lead to eruption of the volcano of violence in the tribal belt that remained dormant in the past, but has now started flaring up after the so called war on terror unleashed following the 9/11 incident.
SAID AFZAL SHINWARI
Landi Kotal
UNDER SRO 481(1)/2007 it is required that, for income tax, banks will issue computerised tax payment receipt to taxpayer vide manual tax payment challan.
However, the format of this computerised receipt and procedure has not been notified to taxpayers.
As a result, tax payments are held up and taxpayers are in confusion.
Will the CBR notify the format and procedure in the press and electronic media at its earliest?
MUHAMMAD YOUNAS
Islamabad
I AM currently residing in Street # 60, F-11/4, Islamabad. All the street lights in my street have been out of order for the last three months or so and I have repeatedly made complaints on the following complaint numbers: 051 9206084, 051 9209317.
Each time I am told that the problem will be fixed the following day or sometimes I am told that there is a problem with a transformer.
Being a tax paying citizen, I would like to know from the authorities concerned how much further time they will take to fix the lights in my dark street.
HAIDER ZULFIQAR
Islamabad
IN THE name of construction and development many working projects, road, parks and so forth are demolished to reconstruct later.
Many such projects only need a minor change or patch- up work which is less costly than putting a new project in its place. In my area where I live a public park was built by the previous city government.
The maintenance of the park has been ignored by the current city government which has decided to build a new park after demolishing the old one. Likewise two new roads about a furlong long which needed only patch work were rebuilt by the present city government. After a fortnight they were dug up because new sewerage lines were to be laid down and a drainage nullah of a different design had to be built.
We cannot blame any particular government for this wasteful practice; every new government indulges in this and recklessly trashes the public money away.
We are a poor nation and heavily under debt and cannot afford to build fabulous parks and when only repairs are needed.
SARFARAZ A. KHAN
Karachi
WORLDWIDE postal service had already become quite fast and efficient since last few decades and through the passage of time more and more services and conveniences were being offered to the consumers.
But sadly, it does not hold true even for the largest city of Pakistan, Karachi, let alone other comparatively smaller cities.
Few decades ago one used to hear that the letters sent from the US are received here in Karachi after 3 to 5 months. As things are supposedly progressing in Pakistan, I took a chance to assume that postal service would have also improved to some extent.
Having assumed this I had sent two letters to different addresses in Karachi but sadly none of the two ever got delivered. It’s a shame that there is nobody who can be held liable for the millions of posted letters that are being lost and there is no means through which we can track the lost letters
HUSSEIN KHOJA
Austen, Texas
BEING an avid fan of the Pakistani cricket team, I was astounded, shocked and outraged at the decision of the selection committee to drop Muhammad Yusuf from the squad for the 20 20 World cup in South Africa.
Agreed Muhammad Yusuf did not perform too well in these matches but perhaps the selection committee has forgotten the adage, 'Form is temporary; class is permanent' when they announced the team. A look at recent history shows that Adam Gilchrist played every match for Australia in the world cup despite being out of form. This is because the Australian selection committee believes in retaining class players and their trust was rewarded by Adam Gilchrist with a magnificent performance in the final of the world cup which helped Australia achieve a momentous victory.
The selection committee needs to realize that such experiments have all failed in the past and without some semblance of experience in the team, there can be no positive growth.
TAYYAB R. BALAGAMWALA
Karachi
IT IS nice to know that at least 15 new CNG buses have arrived under the City government bus project.
Karachi is a very large city which needs different modes of transport so reliance should not be placed solely on a road-based system which did not exactly prove to be an success in the past.
S.R.H. HASH
Karachi
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