According to a notification issued by the Punjab Provincial Transport Authority (PPTA), there will be “no music/movie or vulgarity [will] be tuned/displayed in all type of transport vehicles” till 12th Rabiul Awal. The government of Punjab has declared to celebrate Shan-e-Rehmataul-Lil-Alameen (ﷺ) from a1st Rabiul Awal till 12 Rabiul Awal, reports Geo News.
The notification issued by the PPTA says, “It is desired that during these days no music/movie or vulgarity be tuned/displayed in all types transport vehicles except recitation of Holy Quran, Hamds and Naats especially in the wake of Shan-e-Rehmataul-Lil-Alameen (ﷺ) celebrations.”
All Punjab education boards will announce the results of the Matric and Intermediate Annual Examinations 2021 within 48 hours, reports Khalid Khattak for Geo News.
Punjab Minister for Higher Education Raja Yassir Humayun Sarfraz said that all the Boards of Intermediate and Secondary Education (BISEs) had already prepared results, expressing the hope that the results would be announced soon in Punjab.
There are a total of nine education boards in Punjab including BISE of Lahore, DG Khan, Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Bahawalpur, Multan, Rawalpindi, Sargodha, and Sahiwal.
Students gave their board exams in August and since then no result date was announced.
To facilitate students, it was also decided that all candidates who failed in any subject would be given 33 per cent marks for the purpose of computing averages.
Pakistan has been plagued by episodes of rape and abuse over the years that it has now become common to the extent that people have started normalising such acts.
Back in 2002, Mukhtaran Mai’s gang-rape was one of the most horrifying gang-rape incidents that were reported.
Another major incident that took place in 2014 was the Layyah gang-rape case, where a 20-year-old girl after being gang-raped, was found hanging from a tree. Such inhumane incidents haven’t stopped even now.
Two men stole her money and the jewellery she had on her. They then raped her in front of her two children in a nearby field and escaped.
The incident sparked national outrage but what happened next? Before the arrest of the two culprits, questions like “Why was she out on the motorway so late without a brother or husband? Why didn’t she check her gas tank before leaving the house? And if she had to travel, why didn’t she take the more public GT Road route?” were asked because, sadly, in our country ‘getting raped’ is the woman’s fault. Apparently, a woman gets raped because ‘she was driving alone, on the wrong road, at the wrong time, in the wrong place’.
Later, the motorway rapists were sentenced to death but rape cases continued to rise in Pakistan.
On October 12, 2020, our team started counting rape cases on a daily basis from 13 different sources, which included these newspapers: Dawn, The News, The Express Tribune, The Nation, Pakistan Today, Daily Times, Nawa-e-Waqt, Daily Jang. And from these websites: ARY News, Geo News Samaa News Dunya News Aaj News.
It is to be noted that the given stats only include the reported incidents, not the ones that go unreported.
During the process, we have included reported rape cases of girls, boys, women, men and transgenders. Moreover, we have divided the rape cases province-wise, according to which Punjab till date has the highest number of rape cases, i.e. 936 rape cases and 44 attempted incidents.
It has been a year since we have started posting our rape template daily to analyse the record of reported rape cases. We have collected the data of the entire year (October 12, 2020 to October 12, 2021) and prepared slides of reported cases of each month provinces-wise.
Provinces Categorisation:
Sindh
Till date, Sindh has recorded a total of 60 reported rape cases in which 10 are attempted incidents. 11.6 per cent of cases were reported in the month of April and August as per the graph.
Punjab
Punjab has recorded a total of 936 reported rape cases in which 44 are attempted incidents until now. 13 per cent of cases were reported in August.
Islamabad
The capital has recorded a total of 13 reported rape cases which no attempted cases until now. The reported cases are relatively low as compared to other provinces’ data. However, 38.46 per cent of rape cases were reported in June this year.
Balochistan
Balochistan has reported a total of 11 reported rape cases. Most of the months show zero reported rape cases, according to the graph.
KPK
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) has reported a total of 20 reported rape cases of which 2 were attempted incidents. The numbers throughout the months are quite the same.
Deaths (province-wise)
As per the graph, the death rate was high in the month of January i.e.14.5 per cent.
Numbers of the recorded cases after the highlighted incidents of 2021
After the following incidents, we noticed an increase in the reporting of rape cases.
Mufti Aziz-ur-Rehman: sexual assault case
On June 17, police registered a criminal complaint against Mufti Aziz after a male student accused him of sexual abuse. In the aftermath of a viral graphic video that showed Mufti engaging in sexual intercourse with the male student, who was the victim, the action was taken against Mufti Aziz. After the incident, we noticed an increase of 10.7 per cent in the reporting of rape cases in the month of June.
Usman Mirza’s sexual assault on a couple
Usman Mirza was arrested on July 7. He was seen torturing and assaulting a couple. He was also seen stripping naked a woman in the video. The video sparked outrage across Pakistan. After the petrifying incident, an increase of 9 per cent was observed in the reporting of rape cases in the month of July.
Noor Mukadam’s murder case
On July 20, Noor Mukadam, daughter of former Pakistani diplomat Shaukat Mukadam, was raped, beheaded and murdered, in a posh neighbourhood of Islamabad in July. Noor’s murder led to nationwide protests. After her murder, as per the reported cases we have monitored, there was an increase of 12.6 per cent in the month of August.
There are many more cases that are still unreported due to various reasons.
According to The News, official statistics obtained from the Police, Law, and Justice Commission of Pakistan, Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, Women’s Foundation, and provincial welfare agencies in 2020 revealed that there are at least 11 rape cases reported in Pakistan every day with over 22,000 rape cases reported to the police across the country in the last six years.
The National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) has issued coronavirus guideline for Rabiul Awal celebrations across the country. It is mandatory for religious scholars and naat khuwans to be fully immunised against Covid.
At a meeting led by Asad Umar, it was decided that only licensed and government-approved rallies will be allowed.
Here are other SOPs issued by the NCOC:
Strict implementation of SOPs at milads. It is compulsory for people to wear masks, use sanitisers, and maintain social distancing at celebrations.
Ulemas and naat khuwans to be fully vaccinated against coronavirus.
The government has urged media houses to run live transmissions of milads and other celebrations. This way more people will be able to take part in the celebrations without having to physically attend them.
Special vaccination camps to be set up on 10th Rabiul Awal.
Venues for milads and other celebrations should be open and airy.
A six-feet distance in seating arrangements should be ensured.
Thermal scanners to be set up at entrance points.
Sanitisers and masks to be provided at the entrance.
Health desks to be established at all venues. Only packed food to be distributed.
Earlier, the Sindh government imposed a ban on pillion riding on Eid Milad-un-Nabi, the 12th of Rabiul Awal. It will be celebrated on October 19.
Women, children below 12 years of age, senior citizens, journalists, disabled persons, law enforcers, and employees of essential services have been exempted from the ban.
The petitioner’s lawyer Advocate Khawaja Harris stressed that the case against the petitioners was not based on solid evidence, rather the allegations were highly speculative.
Justice Umar Ata Bandial, during the hearing, pointed out that there was no mention of Adamjee in the IHC’s order denying bail to the duo.
“We are just trying to get the hang of the Noor Mukadam case,” Justice Bandial said while adding that the court was seeking information only to understand the facts of the case.
Khawaja Harris argued that the order to complete the trial in two months will affect the right to a fair trial.
To which the court said that the right to a fair trial was a must. “But the delay in handling the case only adds to anxiety.”
Justice Bandial adjourned the court till October 18. However, last week a sessions court in Islamabad fixed October 14 for the indictment of 12 suspects in the case.
Last week, Zahir Jaffer’s parents challenged IHC’s bail rejection by approaching the SC.
A 280-bed dengue field hospital has been set up at Expo Centre Lahore, Samaa has reported.
Punjab Health Minister Dr Yasmin Rashid, while talking to the media, said the Services Hospital and the Ganga Ram Hospital had been filled to capacity with dengue patients.
“We have 1,209 beds for dengue patients in Lahore,” said Dr Yasmin Rashid, adding that most of the dengue cases were reported from DHA Lahore.
As per Dr Rahsid, the field hospital had been made functional for 24 hours and CBC shall be provided within 45 seconds. Free treatment for fever shall be given to all. All tests shall be done free-of-cost.
صوبائی وزیر صحت ڈاکٹریاسمین راشدنے ایکسپوسنٹرلاہورمیں 280بستروں پر مشتمل ڈینگی فیلڈ ہسپتال کا افتتاح کردیا۔ pic.twitter.com/ckVOY4GOz2
In a meeting chaired by Dr Yasmin Rashid on Friday, a medical emergency at public health facilities in Lahore was declared amid the rising number of dengue cases in the city.
The Pakistan Medical Commission (PMC) released a clarification on the Medical and Dental Colleges Admission Test (MDCAT) 2021 results controversy.
The PMC claimed that it sent out an e-mail before the scheduled time with the result certificates of students who appeared for their MDCAT 2021 due to “a system error”.
The final MDCAT 2021 results were scheduled to be publicised after 1pm today on PMC’s website.
But this morning, many students reported that they had received an e-mail from PMC’s noreply e-mail with their MDCAT 2021 result certificate attached, the PMC explained in a tweet.
The commission explained that the final result was actually to be announced later in the afternoon after the last examination scheduled today in the morning for Covid-affected students.
The results, it said, were accurate but the commission apologised for its “inadvertent error as it has resulted in concern amongst the students”. According to the PMC, an option was provided to download, print, or e-mail the result certificates to students on the PMC website to check their final result.
— Pakistan Medical & Dental Council (@pmc_org) October 9, 2021
“Unfortunately due to an error, the system generated all the result certificates and e-mailed them to students early this morning automatically.” The final score in all the result certificates received by students are correct and have been checked, the PMC said, clarifying that although in a small number of certificates e-mailed to students in the morning there are errors in subject marks, the total score is correct.
This only happened due to the results being generated by the system automatically, PMC said, asking students to ignore these errors. Students can recheck and verify their final results once PMC uploads the live results online.
The victim of Minar-e-Pakistan incident Ayesha Akram — in a supplementary statement — has nominated her associate Amir Sohail alias Rambo, for planning to go to Minar-e-Pakistan, Dawn News reported.
Rambo in a video statement has said that he did not plan to go with Ayesha that day but that he went with her after someone else backed out. He continued by adding that what happened at Minar-e-Pakistan was neither his nor Ayesha’s fault.
She also accused Rambo of making obscene videos of her and blackmailing her. “I have been giving half of my salary to him,” she said, adding that Rambo —along with one of his partners, Badshah — had been running a “TikTok gang”. Rambo has been arrested, Dawn reported.
A video went viral on social media in August that showed a woman being sexually assaulted by a large group of men at Minar-e-Pakistan in Lahore on August 14, Pakistan’s Independence Day. The incident was later confirmed after a First Information Report (FIR) was registered. The incident sparked nationwide protests.
The Sindh Blood Transfusion Authority (SBTA) has revealed that a total of 1,357 people were diagnosed with HIV in Sindh during the first eight months of 2021 after their blood samples were tested at the blood banks in 24 districts of the province, Waqar Bhatti reported for Geo News.
“During the first eight months of this year, around 455,742 donors donated their blood at 166 blood banks in the 24 districts of Sindh, of which 1,357 donors were found to be infected with HIV, which amounts to 0.29% of the samples,” Dr Durre Naz Jamal, the SBTA director, revealed in a meeting of the provincial health department.
“Of the 455,742 blood samples tested in the province, around 24,088 were found reactive or infected with either of five different diseases,” Dr Durre Naz said as she explained that 5.28% (24,088) of the donors were diagnosed with one or more infectious diseases and could not donate blood. Blood samples in Pakistan are screened for five infectious diseases — HIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, syphilis, and malaria — to prevent recipients from having these diseases through blood transfusion but sometimes, unscreened blood is transfused to people as most of the blood banks lack the facility of nucleic acid testing (NAT), a molecular technique for screening the donated blood.
The SBTA data presented to the provincial health minister revealed that 8,155 or 1.79% of blood donors in Sindh were infected with hepatitis B while 7,995 or 1.75% were infected with hepatitis C.
In addition to that, as many as 6,142 blood donors were found to be infected with syphilis, a sexually transmitted infection. The percentage of the donors infected with syphilis was 1.34, Dr Durre Naz said, adding that 448 blood donors had also been found to be infected with malaria. According to the data presented to the health department, the highest number of blood donors infected with HIV were found in Karachi’s District East where 653 persons were found to have HIV in their blood, followed by District South of Karachi, where 431 blood donors were found to be infected with HIV.
Similarly, Karachi’s District South had the highest number of blood donors infected with hepatitis B and C, where 2,603 donors were found to be infected with HBV and 2,923 blood donors with HCV.
Directing the SBTA to strictly implement the screening system for safe blood transfusion across the province, Dr Pechuho said a dashboard of blood screening results should be immediately established to prevent the spread of diseases caused by blood transfusions.
A newly-wed bride has sued one of the top marriage venues in the United Kingdom (UK) for £150,000 (approximately Rs 34,935,942) after she slipped on a spilt drink on a dancefloor and broke her elbow.
As per reports, bride Cara Donovan — who is a teacher by profession — has sued the company after she slipped on the ‘highly slippery’ laminated plastic floor, lit by underfloor LED lights.
Donovan alleged that she slipped on spilled drinks after the staff failed to stop guests from taking their drinks onto the floor. She added that the tables were positioned by the edge of the floor, allowing guests to dance and drink. Even after people spilled drinks on the floor, no one came to mop it up.
The incident happened in September 2018 but left the bride with a badly broken elbow. Despite three operations, the woman says she has been suffering from permanent arm pain.
Since then, she hasn’t been able to get back to work as a special-needs teacher. Blaming the company for what happened to her, she has now sued Country House Weddings Ltd, which was once voted the Best UK Wedding Venue by magazine readers.
