Federal Minister for Railways Sheikh Rasheed was spotted buying what looks like aromatherapy essential oils with PM Imran Khan’s buddy Aneel Mussarat in London. While we don’t exactly know what he bought we can recommend oils we think would work best for his personality and job.
Sandalwood Oil
Used to calm nerves. Sheikh was in big trouble after the Railway’s Rs 28.62 billion loss was made public. So he could do with something to calm his nerves.
Lavender Oil
Helps with stress relief. Opposition parties were asking for Sheikh’s resignation after 80 train accidents took place in his first year.
Rosemary Oil
Helps with focus. We all need more of Sheikh’s famous predictions.
Acricket umpire has died one month after being hit on the head by a ball during a domestic match, BBC has reported.
Mr. Williams was supervising a
Pembrokeshire County Division 2 match between Pembroke and Narbeth when he was
hit by a ball.
He was taken to a hospital and was later rushed to the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff when he was in an induced coma. Williams was transferred to Withybush Hospital in Haverford west on August 1 where he died two weeks later.
After the tragic death of
Australian cricketer Phillip Hughes in 2014, safety concerns in cricket have
been under surveillance. Hughes was hit on the head by a Sean Abbott bouncer
during a native game. He went into a coma and never recovered consciousness.
The much-awaited second season of Netflix’s Sacred Games was
dropped on Indian Independence Day, and if you want us to save you some time…
we’re disappointed.
It isn’t easy to be divided between watching Ganesh Gaitonde
(Nawazuddin Siddiqui) back in action and sticking to the idea of shunning Indian
productions at a time when Pakistan and India aren’t the best of friends.
However, having watched the eight-episode series, we can
guarantee that you won’t miss out on anything as great as the first season, in
case you’re planning not to watch it.
Expanding beyond the novel by Vikram Chandra, the second season has left us disillusioned of Anurag Kashyap and co.’s ability to do wonders.
To quickly recap the first season, because Netflix won’t, Sacred Games is one drawn-out game of cat-and-mouse between notorious Mumbai gangster Gaitonde and his chosen police mark, Sartaj Singh (Saif Ali Khan), trying to figure out the former’s dastardly (and as-yet-unknown) plans set in motion.
SPOILERS AHEAD!
The second picks up halfway through the 25 days left to save
Mumbai from uncertain calamity. Singh dives back into the investigation,
following a trail that points to nuclear weapons, terrorism and Gaitonde’s link
to Khanna Guruji (Pankaj Tripathi).
Gaitonde, still narrating to Singh but actually to us, calls Guruji his third father, to whom he and so many others are drawn like moths to a flame.
But, as one could’ve imagined (keeping in view flashbacks and
those mysterious mandalas from the first season), the ashram is actually a cult
and its leaders the liaisons between Gaitonde’s drug trade and the weapons
Singh suspects will be used to attack Mumbai over a decade later.
Just after the new twists are registered – and half the season is gone – one starts waiting for things to get as interesting as promised by cast members time and again. You start looking forward to something big enough for the season to beat its predecessor… and in all honesty, to make sense.
It isn’t later you realise that Sacred Games has successfully
pulled a Game of Thrones and disappointed you more than Gaitonde was upon realising
how Guruji deceived him as a pawn, for his own plans to create a “new world”.
All this remains the tip of a story lost somewhere between
juggling too many balls – crowing Singh as the hero, unnecessary exaggeration,
Pakistan being portrayed as the villain, gang wars, Soviet-Afghan War, 9/11 and
26/11 attacks and so much more.
Without spoiling the not-so-much a cliffhanger finale, it’s safe to say that both Gaitonde and the show might have lost the legacy which followers strived to honour after the first season (and we don’t really mind).
Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has earned a revenue of Rs7-8 billion from Hajj operations against the anticipated figure of Rs25 billion, The Express Tribune reported.
According to reports, around 250,000 people went to perform Hajj from Pakistan this year. Out of the total number of pilgrims, PIA flew more than 82,000 pilgrims, which is 20% more than previous year’s 68,000.
PIA and Saudi Airlines, being major services, covered around 100,000 Pakistani pilgrims, while the remaining pilgrims were carried by Airblue, Etihad, Emirates and others.
Further details reveal that the Hajj package offered by the government this year cost around Rs400,000 while privately undertaken pilgrimage has no upper limit and can go up to Rs3 million.
Meanwhile, the ticket prices from Lahore, Islamabad ranged from Rs110,000 to Rs150,000 and tickets from Karachi airport cost between Rs100,000-Rs105,000.
DISCLAIMER: This review is not sponsored. The Current has done its own independent research for this review.
Looking to buy a fridge? Which one is the most popular in Pakistan? We compare two – Dawlance and Kenwood – that are the most popular in your city. According to our research, Orient, PEL and Haier are also very popular but salespeople at local stores claim that these two are the ones which are most commonly bought.
The table below gives a brief outline of the two fridges.
Dawlance
Kenwood
Rs 33,000 – 55,000
Rs 45,000 – 65,000
Service Centres: 4 in Karachi, 2 in Lahore
Service Centres: 4 in Karachi, 3 in Lahore
3-way cooling
Unbreakable models
Works on low voltage
Best in load shedding
Warranty – 12 years
Warranty – 3 years
Because of its services, price and warranty time period, Dawlance emerges as a winner.
The Sri Lankan cricket team, despite its bitter experience of the past, has agreed to play a Test series in Pakistan, a private media outlet reported Saturday.
According to reports, the decision was taken after a security delegation from Sri Lankan Cricket (SLC) visited Pakistan from August 7 to 9 to evaluate the security conditions in the country.
The security team visited three major cities, including Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad.
PCB’s director for international cricket, Zakir Khan, and the head of security, Colonel Asif Mehmood, briefed the security team about the arrangements being made at the stadium for the series.
The team was assured of foolproof security for the guest team during its visit to Pakistan.
SLC Secretary de Silva thanked Pakistan for inviting them for security assessment and said: “We had a very fruitful discussion and briefing about the arrangements being made for the test match here.”
Earlier, PCB had invited the Sri Lankan cricket team to come to Pakistan this October and play two Test matches in the country.
The series will be the first of its kind to be played in the country ever since the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team 10 years ago.
Soon after the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) held its first-ever meeting over the Kashmir issue in almost 50 years, India has backtracked on its statement and admitted that Indian-occupied Kashmir (IoK) is disputed territory.
According to The Express Tribune, facing a barrage of questions in a press briefing following the historic meeting at the UN headquarters on Friday, India’s envoy to the United Nations Syed Akbaruddin said that India was committed to the Shimla Agreement inked with Pakistan in 1972, which explicitly declares Kashmir as disputed between the two countries.
Earlier, New Delhi had regularly blocked discussion on held Kashmir at the UN, saying it considers the matter an “internal affair”.
“So let me begin by coming across to you and shaking your hand… as we’ve already extended our hand of friendship by saying we are committed to Shimla Agreement. Let us wait on that from the Pakistani side,” said the Indian ambassador while awkwardly reaching out to Pakistani journalists and shaking their hands.
WATCH VIDEO:
Responding to a question, he said: “In closed consultations at the UNSC, anyone, especially parties to the dispute, can try and throw in anything at the members of the Security Council. That’s the nature of the beast.”
“We are ready to address these issues in a matter in which states who have normal approaches to international ties address them… and in our case, we are committed to Shimla Agreement,” he added.
Pakistan has taken exception to Indian defence minister’s statement on the use of nuclear weapons, saying the “substance and timing of the statement was highly unfortunate and reflective of India’s irresponsible and belligerent behaviour”.
Rajnath Singh had on Friday said that New Delhi may see a major shift in its nuclear weapons doctrine by doing away with the ‘no first use’ policy in the future. ‘No first use’ is a pledge to not use nuclear weapons as a means of warfare unless first attacked by an opposition using its nuclear arms.
“Till today, our nuclear policy is ‘no first use’. What happens in future depends on the circumstances,” the Indian defence minister had said while addressing a gathering in Pokhran, the site of India’s nuclear tests in 1998.
In a subsequent tweet, Singh had added:
Pokhran is the area which witnessed Atal Ji’s firm resolve to make India a nuclear power and yet remain firmly committed to the doctrine of ‘No First Use’. India has strictly adhered to this doctrine. What happens in future depends on the circumstances.
— Rajnath Singh (मोदी का परिवार) (@rajnathsingh) August 16, 2019
“It further exposes the pretense of their no first use policy, to which we have never accorded any credence,” Pakistan Foreign Office said while reacting to the Indian defence minister’s statement.
“No first use pledge is non-verifiable and cannot be taken at face value, especially when the development of offensive capabilities and force postures belie such claims,” the statement read and added that Pakistan always proposed measures relating to nuclear restraint in South Asia.
“Pakistan will continue to maintain a credible minimum deterrence posture.”
Police have arrested a couple allegedly involved in kidnapping, sexually abusing, blackmailing and also recording inappropriate videos of 45 girls in Rawalpindi. The accused identified as Qasim Jahangir and Kiran Mehmood confessed to the crime.
As per reports, the action was taken after a complaint was filed by a victim, a student of Allama Iqbal Open University. The student said that she was kidnapped from outside Gordon College by a woman who pretended to be a fellow student. She said that her brother was coming to pick her up. After a few minutes, when her “brother” arrived in a grey car, the woman pushed the victim inside the car and threatened her with a knife. The student was then taken to a house in Gulistan Colony where Qasim, the husband, allegedly raped her while the wife recorded a video of the crime. They blackmailed the girl by showing her video. Later at night, she was released on Tipu Road.
Police officials said that the couple had sold the videos and photos to an international porn website. The wife has been sent to Adiala jail on judicial remand while the husband is in police custody on physical remand.
The police have also involved the FIA as they do not have modern technology to examine laptops and other devices used by the accused.
After India revoked Article 370 which granted special status to Indian occupied Kashmir, tensions between the two neighbouring countries reached an all-time high. Following that the Government of Pakistan announced that they will cut all ties with India effective immediately. Bollywood films have been banned in Pakistani cinemas for a while now.
Bollywood actor Sonam Kapoor who has a wide fanbase in Pakistan and has shared the screen with Pakistan heartthrob Fawad Khan spoke at length about the unrest in the IoK and said that she is very disturbed with all that’s happening.
Talking to the BBC Asian Network, Kapoor said, “It’s heartbreaking to see where the situation has landed right now but I’m very patriotic. So I think for me now it’s better to keep quiet and let this pass because even this too should pass. Our countries were one country like 70 years ago and the fact that there is so much divisive politics at play is really heartbreaking.”
Sonam continued that she is very upset about the ban on Bollywood in Pakistan because “as an artist, you want to be represented everywhere and you want your work to be shown everywhere,” adding that she was heartbroken when her film Neerja wasn’t allowed to be screened in Pakistan.
“I have a huge Pakistani following and my two best friends are Muslims and half Pakistanis,” Sonam said.
On her thoughts on the Kashmir conflict, Sonam remarked, “I think it’s very complicated and I don’t understand it as much because there is so much contrasting news everywhere so I don’t really know what the truth is.”
“I
believe in having a peaceful discourse and understanding what’s going on. So
when I have the complete information is when I think I can give an opinion.”
The Kapoors have been very open about their roots on this side of the border.
“I am half Sindhi and half Peshawari. It’s heartbreaking to see that part of my culture is something that I can’t explore as well because of that,” Sonam said.
The Kashmir situation on the Indian-administered side continues to divide people, including in Bollywood.
Actress Sonam Kapoor has been speaking to us about it and says it’s upsetting because of her family’s links to the region. pic.twitter.com/Uz5Leujiaz
Sonam shared that her parents named her when they visited the valley and that she hopes peace would return to the picturesque valley soon so she can also go and visit it one day.
“I hope there is a peaceful way of working things out. I don’t know how that’s possible but I think there should be because it’s a beautiful place but I think it’s been under so much duress and I don’t think anybody knows who’s right now,” Sonam finished.
