ISLAMABAD: More Pakistanis than Indians favour “cooperative” relations between Islamabad and New Delhi but people from both countries consider either state the “least friendly” country, said a survey released by Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency (Pildat).
The survey was conducted nationwide by Pildat with the support and assistance of Danish International Development Agency (Danida) and the Centre of the Study of Developing Sciences (CSDS) Delhi.
The purpose for the survey was to measure various trends in both countries on democracy, trust of the people in different state institutions, their expectations of their elected representatives and impact of television and newspapers.
The ‘Views on State Democracy in South Asia: 2013 Pakistan Report’ was jointly launched by Danish Ambassador to Islamabad Jesper Moller Sorensen and Pildat executive director Ahmed Bilal Mehmood at a local hotel where experts on the subject and parliamentarians expressed their views on the report. The ‘Indian Report’ was released by CSDS director Sanjay Kumar, who specially flew to Islamabad to attend the event.
Only 35 officials paid income tax
PESHAWAR: If income tax details revealed by the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) are to be believed, the big guns among Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa’s (KP) politicians are from the poorest section of the province.
According to the Parliamentarians Tax Directory issued by FBR on February 15, of the 97 lawmakers of the provincial assembly who filed their tax returns, only 35 paid taxes while only two paid the income support levy (ISL).
The government has imposed the ISL at the rate of 0.5 per cent of the value of all moveable assets an individual owns. More interestingly, of a house of 124, only 97 bothered to make the effort of filing their returns.
Cyber crimes bailable
ISLAMABAD: The newly formulated draft of Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act 2014 proposes some stringent punishments for cyber crimes but leaves all offences as bailable.
Many of the cyber crimes - including cyber terrorism, unauthorised interception, illegal access to information system and programme or data, illegal interference with programme or data, electronic forgery, identity crime and protection of women - have been covered under the proposed legislation.
However, the draft law, which will become act once the parliament approves it, is likely to face criticism as it gives absolute immunity to security agencies from any prosecution.
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