Pak Affairs

Introduction Land signifies different things to different segments of society. Whatever use it may be put to, land is, succinctly, a repository of capital, fertile source of wealth, vehicle of getting into the socio-political mainstream, agency of gaining political leverage, instrument of getting let-in into the corridors of power and means to climbing up the higher rungs of the ladder …

On need to prioritise education reforms Quality education is the most powerful weapon for change, but the successive governments in Pakistan have been largely indifferent to the need to equip people with the power of effective education. Sadly, despite great importance of education in today’s globalised world, there are still around 24 million out-of-school children in the country and the …

How difficult is to do business in Pakistan? The World Bank has released its annual report “Doing Business 2018” that contains information on business regulations in 190 countries of the world. It measures how close each economy is to global best practices in business regulations. It has ranked Pakistan at 147th position on its Ease of Doing Business Index. In …

By: Urooj Bashir Few days back, while surfing on the internet, I came across some websites and Facebook pages on which lawyers across Pakistan offer their services for arranging the “court marriages” to the interested people. Some of them even offered to keep it “secret from general public”. They discussed the ages, documents, expenses and other related information in a …

  Pakistan’s interests must be protected India and Afghanistan have joined hands against Pakistan and China’s joint venture, China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Chabahar Port, which India is constructing in Iran as a counter to Pakistan’s Gwadar Port, is being portrayed as a competitor and an alternative to CPEC, and a better option for routing Afghanistan’s transit trade. Besides opportunities for …

A prerequisite for democracy After the ouster of former prime minister, Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif, in Panama Case, there has been a lot of hue and cry both for and against the verdict of the Supreme Court of Pakistan. Given this state of affairs, it is important to understand the most basic requirements of a true democracy. Most people in …

Needless to say, water is one of the most vital substances on earth. All organisms need it for subsistence. The earth would turn into a hell if there were no water. It is the lifeline that sustains humans as well as all the flora and fauna on earth. The anthropological studies reveal that water symbolized the very essence of life …

Introduction Crime is a social phenomenon and response to it constitutes the very criminal justice system of a country. In Pakistan, the response to crime in a systemic manner suffers from many a problem. One of the weaknesses, as noted by various experts, is the protection of witnesses, who, in turn, feed into the testimonial evidence relied on by the …

Corruption, a term widely used across the globe, refers to acts of cheating or illegal acts and may also involve abuse of public office for private gain. However, the term is also misused in a number of contexts. For instance, many people tend to think every case of cheating or forgery as corruption; however, corruption may involve all cheating but …

Introduction Generally speaking, tax reforms are meant to reduce burden of taxes on poor and middle class, to attract investment, to increase burden on non-compliant taxable persons, to minimize discretionary powers of tax authorities, to remove sectoral distortions in domestic taxes, to broaden the tax base and to maximize the size of formal economy. On 21st June 2017, in order …