Monday, November 23, 2009
Phone Fury
Track Your Car
Friday, November 20, 2009
War by America in Afghanistan
But these were short-lived as the characteristics afghan resistance began. The reason was that United States and his military has under estimated the enemy.
Not only that, they have also committed two strategic blunders, the consequences of which are being not only suffered by the American but also the Pakistani people.
The first blunder was to allow the Taliban to escape to Pakistan. Had they secured the Durand line crossing sites prior to initiates the air bombing campaign? The second blunder was to put their military effort in the wrong direction, Iraq which left the main theatre, Afghanistan, undermanned.
Instead admitting the mistakes, whit house blames to Pakistan for their failure in war against terrorism, even though Pakistan had done far more than them.
The new appointed commander namely Gen Stanley McChrytal just in one operation concludes that “the situation is serious”, and that he would need 40,000 more troops. He has thus placed the president in a serious dilemma.
The situation has become more serious all these years because of serious imbalance in the mission assigned and the resource allocated- only Gen McChrytal has found that out now. The mission assigned to the US military when it was first deployed in Afghanistan is yet to accomplish eight years on. Why? The pentagon needs to ponder over this.
All military planning begin after the mission assigned. The mission analyzed in several factors, the main ones being the enemy (size, strengths, weakness), and from these emerge the resources that would be required to accomplished the mission in the given timeframe.
The pentagon’s appreciation of the enemy was the serious flawed. Taliban fighters are highly motivated as they are fighting got freedom from foreign occupation like the American Partisan Patriots did during the War of Independence. They are skilled, tenacious, resilient, battle-hardened, cunning, and masters of surprise and improvisation. Since time is always on the side of guerrillas, their strategy to war sown the enemy by making them bleed from a thousand wounds. History records that almost all military defeats were caused by one factor alone- misappreciation of enemy.
What was the mission assigned to the Gen McChrystal when he was appointed to the top post in Afghanistan? He was expected to defeat the insurgency, or at least create condition that allows the US troops to withdraw gracefully, which his predecessors fail to do. That the US high command is taking their time on his request for more troops, clearly suggestion hat he was to make do with the resources already there.
Gen McChrytal declared priority to secure Afghan population centers until Afghan forces are ready to assume responsibility for their country by 2013. Four to five years more? What would he do when his battlefield, which is presently confined to the southern and eastern parts of the country, is extended by the Taliban to the rest of the country?
How many more troops would he ten ask for?
A defensive counter-insurgency strategy can never succeed as it leave initiate with the guerillas. Finally history would repeat itself when are forced out Vietnam style. The only way Afghan population centers can be secured and people’s support won is through an offensive strategy that aims to dominate, and then defeat the insurgency. Thus, a sequence of operational movements would have to be initiated to up for the lost time: first, to secure the Durand line crossing sites to prevent the Guerillas from escaping to Pakistan; second isolate the area selected for the operation to prevent their escape from it; third to secure the mountains to deny their use as sanctuaries; and finally, to force them into the valleys for taking hem out by ground and air –delivered firepower.
An offensive strategy would need far more troops. The Americans went to Afghanistan to fight a war. They should plan to win it- unless they want to be known as superpower defeated twice by Guerillas. Blaming Pakistan and prodding it to ‘do more’ would not win the war for them.
Downfall of SME
In the last fiscal year, the SME sector grew 7.5 per cent but thousand of SMEs had to cut production, suspend business and sack employees as large-scale manufacturing (LSM) declined by 8.4 per cent, resulting in huge job orders. In addition, a 2 per cent plus inflation and almost equal bank interest rates couples with electricity and gas shortages hit them hard. Now as LSM has begun crawling up, inflation has decelerated and interest rates softened, business opportunities are opening up for SMEs. Some large-scale industries that have picked up pace, like automobiles, electronics, light engineering, edible oil, chemicals and paper board, outsource a lot of ancillary items from them. If they keep growing- and chances are that they will- it will lift sagging output of SMEs in manufacturing sector.
However, revival of textile industry that accounts for one third of LSM is still not insight and this may impact many of the SMEs’ productivity.
An executive member of the Union of small & medium enterprises (UNISAME) said, “Many of our colleagues who suspended work in the last fiscal year have reinstalled sacked employees and restarted production”.
“initially we have seen activity in downstream for automobiles, electronics and light engineering,” but “Banks have almost stopped lending to SMEs and that can block growth of this sector.” bankers say they have restarted making fresh loans to the private sector but they admit that lending to SMEs is still negligible. In October 2009, banks gave Rs72 billion fresh loan to private sector.
“The problem with SME sector is that its non-performing loan (NPLs) as percentage of net loans almost doubled in the last fiscal year which forced us to halt lending and see what went wrong and where. Some banks are still in that process while others are past this exercise and would soon restart lending to SMEs.
Representatives of SMEs say lack of access to bank credit is a perennial problem for almost all small business insisting that banks mostly lend to medium-sized enterprises that employ 50 or more people in their business and not to small business units.
The state bank of governor has launched a pilot programmed for training and development of SME portfolio of Rs383 “out of the total SME portfolio of Rs383 billion only Rs38.3 billion (or 10 percent) was being channeled to business entities having less than 20 employees.”
The causes of it probably be “unorganized way of doing business of small entities.” Most banks do not have tailor-made credit products for SMEs nor do they have the systems, tools and the expertise to examine SMEs credit proposal professionally and monitor their loan portfolios efficiently. These factors compel banks to regard SME loans as riskier and charge a higher interest, thus restricting SMEs’ outreach to bank credit.
The SBP has lately allowed commercial banks to lend up to Rs3 million to SMEs without collaterals and is encouraging hem to introduce cash-flow based methodology instead of relying on traditional collateral-based lending.
The SBP step towards giving training to credit officers based in SME clusters in Lahore, Peshawar, Quetta, Rawalpindi, Karachi, Sialkot, and Gujrawala. The central bank is also establishing a Credit Guarantee Fund for Small and Rural Enterprises with the help of DFID of the UK.
These measures along with better economic environment may help SMEs revive their business. But the government will have to offer sector –specific incentives for SMEs keeping in view the origins of growth in our domestic economy and the areas that may show increase in domestic consumption. SMEDA officials named various areas where immediate action plan need to be implemented.
These include fruits and vegetable processing/packaging ; edible oil extraction from local oilseeds; cotton ginning; yarn; grey cloth making, manufacturing of readymade garments and other articles of textiles excluding towels and bed wear for domestic consumption; sports goods particularly gloves making and jewelry and furniture manufacturing etc.
In service sector, businessmen point out that SMEs catering to or involved in construction, transport, storage and communication, wholesale and retail trade are well-positioned to grow during this fiscal year. But thy say that unlike the SMEs in manufacturing sector fins it even harder to seek financing facilities from banks.
One of the reason that restrict SMEs access to formal financing is that foreign banks are simply averse to lending this sector and Islamic banks are yet to find ways to enhance their exposure. Foreign banks have around 0.5 percent shared in SMEs financing and Islamic banks about five per cent.
Major economies including China and India are now focused on driving domestic demand amidst a slow reversal of global recessionary trend. Pakistan also needs to continue a minimum stimulus spending to revive its own domestic consumption.
Some concrete steps to revive the SME sector like, providing seed money for setting up workers’ training institution and allowing duty drawbacks on machinery can help.
Businessmen suggest that part of export development funds can also be diverted to the SMEs with backward and forward linkages with export-oriented industries. Also SMEs in SMEs cluster cities must get maximum electricity and gas- and if load shedding becomes inevitable it must done under a per-announced schedule so that SMEs could rescheduled their work hours.
Monday, July 27, 2009
VOICE OF A CHILD
Most of the children work in the gas filling stations filling gas in cars, doing motor mechanics work, working in small unhygienic hotel, washing the cars, selling different products in the public places, and many more. Let’s realize the children rights. We can contribute to the rights of children by stop taking work from them and parents should realized the need of the children and give them the basic of them so that they may not get betrayed.
SUMMER HEADACHES
Summer can be headache free but how? That’s the main question is! People who suffer from headache know that the season brings with it unbearable heat, making body temperature high and make things worse, especially in our part of the world. A headache is a pain in the head or tissues surrounding the upper neck. The condition becomes worsens particularly in summer, as the scorching heat and sunlight trigger severe headaches, The cause a damage of small arteries in the scalp.
Now here are some common causes and preventive measures to avert headaches in this summer:
Meal timings
Skipping meal can be one of the prime cause headaches. If you feel headache because of prolonged fasting, break it and eat and you will feel a lot better instantly.
Lie down and use ice on your shoulders, neck and temples. Also, you can take some kind of pain killer for reducing headache to some extent.
Ice-cream headache
Perhaps the most common headache in summer is the ice-creme headache, trigger by the ingestion of cold beverages. One can easily get rid from this headache by avoiding cold fluids and ice crème, or simply by taking smaller and slower mouthfuls, so that the substance warms up quicker in the mouth. Another way to melt away ice crème headache is by pressing one’s tongue into the palate of the mouth.
Body posture
Poor body posture leads to tension headache, so it is better to maintain good body posture. You need to stretch your body every now and then at work, since the muscles of neck and shoulders contract due to poor body postures. Hence stretching help relive headache tremendously.
Bright light
Many headache suffers are sensitive to bright light and avoid it when they have a headache. So, bright light may be a headache trigger.
One should wear sunglasses for protection. A hat or cap may be helpful during the day.
Stress
During every one has to face stressful time and stress is major headache for trigger. This kind of suffers can easily manage stress by plan ahead of time for big family get-to gathers and holidays to avoid tension headache. Fort instance, try to avoid the last minutes shopping, ensuring that your car is serviced before traveling, and make travel reservations well in advance. Tension headache radiate pain through the neck and shoulders. A gently massage to scalp or shoulders good solution for this type of headache.
Herbal treatments
Betel leaves have cooling and analgesic properties. A paste made out of betel leaves applied to the center of headache gives immediate relief. The aroma of cloves is soothing for nerves.
Henna flowers have also tremendous cooling properties. It can be mixed with vinegar to get better results in excessive heat. Garlic and vinegar also have miraculous properties in reliving headache.
One can also soak almond in warm water overnight. Grind them into a paste in the morning and warm them slightly in pure ghee. Mix this in water or milk and drink. This helps in treating chronic headache problems. However it is not advised for head or cholesterol patients.
Dehydration
During summer, people prone to headache suffering should drink plenty if fluids to avoid headache. During summer, it is important to keep the body hydrated. It is better to drink plain water as carbonate soft drinks contains substance that trigger headache.
Substance that headache suffers should avoid include common ingredients in soft drinks such as caffeine and aspartame.
However it is very essential for those who are persistently suffering from headache to go regular medical and neurological examination to a special, especially if they have fever and neck pain along with headache.
Friday, May 29, 2009
GLOBAL VOICE OR GLOBAL WARNING
SUPERSTITIOUS
In western culture, the number 13 is perceived as unlucky; and buildings completely skip the number 13 floor. If a man accidentally spilled salt, he would throw salt over his left shoulder in order to make the devil blind who sits there. Opening an umbrella indoor is thought to result of 21 days striving. Breaking the mirror will result to bring hardship of seven years. Some body in western country has dropped the pocket mirror while fixing the tie and shattered it. “Oh no!” he yelled to his wife. “Now I am to face a seven miserable years. “ Nonsense, “the women countered. “My uncle once has broken a mirror and he did not have seven bad years. “Really?” the man felt encouraged. If the women does not tell him this then he will die in that day. As we have seemed in movies that European has a full quota of superstitious. In Sweden, placing keys on the table is seems to be unlucky. Moreover collecting nine or seven different flowers and put them under your pillow means that your will dream of your future spouse. In UK it is bad to put new shoes on a bed or table. In Russia, if a person wants to have a safe journey, he should sit on the luggage.
Asia is the most fertile breed of superstitious beliefs. In Chine, Japan and Korea, number 4 is unlucky. Building having number 4 floor is vacant in these countries. In Sri Lanka, crying of an owl in night, it is a signature of death of the villager. If you see a lizard before going out, it is better not to leave home.
Superstitious beliefs are almost same in the Indo-Pak subcontinent despite religious and cultural differences. Like, pregnant women should avoid coming in the open during an eclipse. A black cat your path does means that you should change your path immediately. If you get hiccups, it means that you are remembering by some one near and dear. If the left eye of a woman quivers, she is going to get some good news. A black mark is necessary on your forehead if you go to the party.
Finally, people developed personal superstitious. Directors of film make their luck associated with the successful films. At this moment I am having a little itch in my palm. So I stop here as I belief that I will receive money when I publication of this article on my blog.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
HOW PAKISTAN CAN BE ON THE ROAD OF SUCCESS?
Today the scenario is totally changed. No one is safe in this criminal and terrorist climate that is prevailing in my country. Pakistani people want dignity and peace in their country. But as longer as the blame game in on in Pakistan, it would be harder to provide the peace and dignity in the country.
Acknowledging this gap between the needs of the people and the performance of various governments, a few suggestions can be more effective if it may be implemented with a clear thinking and honesty.
Instead of blaming each other, each current and up coming government should take solid steps in providing the harming and peace in the environment otherwise this recurring crisis will make Pakistan an untenable state.
Instead of implementing and supporting the Washington’s agenda in Asia, government should implement its own agenda that best suited to its people of Pakistan.
Provide justice, liberty and protection of life in the society and also find ways for achieving the socioeconomic prosperity otherwise history will repeat like the one that occurred in the separation of the East wing of the country in 1971.
Implement only those development schemes whose interest is to bring up standard of living for under-privileged classes. It can serve the purpose of eradication of poverty in the country.
finally but not the least that government should not give free hand to privatization in the country that it served the interest of few business man only.
Pakistani people want peace, dignity, prosperity, harmony, justice and equality of opportunity in the country. Let’s see how much time it will take to become Pakistan on the road of success.
LIFE OF A NOBLE GOVERNMENT SERVANT
My first salary was in hundreds in digits and I bought a mobile form the salary to connect with my relatives and family. This was my first advancement in entering in the life style of upper class people.
I got married after three years of my service as a government employee. After a short span of time I got promotion, government car and a transfer letter l. This was an exciting day for me but transferring from one place to another was a new experience for me. I have shared this achievement with my wife and my family also. That day we had a dinner in a continental hotel.
I packed my entire bag and baggage and went to the new place. Now I made up my mind that transferring from one place to another is a part of government service. The next day when I reached to my office my new colleagues was standing for a warm welcome to say “Welcome Sir, Welcome”.
During my government service I bought a new car but that new car does not remain in my custody. I have to sell it for some family constraints.
After forty year of my service I realized that it is a time to make my dream true which I have buried forty years back. That dream was to own a house. I bought a plot away from the main city that I could only bought in my limited salary.
After two years of time, I made a half portion of my house. I took some loan from my family and from the bank. Some of my family members denied me to give loan by stating different excuses. But God knows that how someone feels when you live in an half built home.
Now I have four daughters and one son. I have to marry my elder daughter as it is the part of life. When I felt that it’s a good proposal, I marry my daughters. As it is the tradition of our society that daughter need to bring lot of luggage (JAHEEZ) form its husband. If parents do not fulfill their demands, the daughter has to face the pinching words of her husband and her family through out her life. I have also fulfilled the demands of them through my little salary and by taking more loans from my family. But God knows how I fulfilled that demands.
The life goes on and I got old. My life was now rotated around the different activities like paying the monthly installments of loan, arranging the food for the family, fulfilling the endless demands of my married daughters, and many more.
Now my son got his master degree when ten years of my retirement was left. I saw my future in my son that my son would be helping hand for me. But as soon as he got married and get his new job, he went abroad with her wife.
Now I had retired from my service. I had achieved many things in my life but I could not archive the love and warm feelings of hug of my younger son. I still pay the monthly installments of my house. At this stage I need a helping hand, but unfortunately I am a person who have hands but without a helping hand. Why it happens in life? Why?
LIFE OF A NOBLE GOVERNMENT SERVANT
My first salary was in hundreds in digits and I bought a mobile form the salary to connect with my relatives and family. This was my first advancement in entering in the life style of upper class people.
I got married after three years of my service as a government employee. After a short span of time I got promotion, government car and a transfer letter l. This was an exciting day for me but transferring from one place to another was a new experience for me. I have shared this achievement with my wife and my family also. That day we had a dinner in a continental hotel.
I packed my entire bag and baggage and went to the new place. Now I made up my mind that transferring from one place to another is a part of government service. The next day when I reached to my office my new colleagues was standing for a warm welcome to say “Welcome Sir, Welcome”.
During my government service I bought a new car but that new car does not remain in my custody. I have to sell it for some family constraints.
After forty year of my service I realized that it is a time to make my dream true which I have buried forty years back. That dream was to own a house. I bought a plot away from the main city that I could only bought in my limited salary.
After two years of time, I made a half portion of my house. I took some loan from my family and from the bank. Some of my family members denied me to give loan by stating different excuses. But God knows that how someone feels when you live in an half built home.
Now I have four daughters and one son. I have to marry my elder daughter as it is the part of life. When I felt that it’s a good proposal, I marry my daughters. As it is the tradition of our society that daughter need to bring lot of luggage (JAHEEZ) form its husband. If parents do not fulfill their demands, the daughter has to face the pinching words of her husband and her family through out her life. I have also fulfilled the demands of them through my little salary and by taking more loans from my family. But God knows how I fulfilled that demands.
The life goes on and I got old. My life was now rotated around the different activities like paying the monthly installments of loan, arranging the food for the family, fulfilling the endless demands of my married daughters, and many more.
Now my son got his master degree when ten years of my retirement was left. I saw my future in my son that my son would be helping hand for me. But as soon as he got married and get his new job, he went abroad with her wife.
Now I had retired from my service. I had achieved many things in my life but I could not archive the love and warm feelings of hug of my younger son. I still pay the monthly installments of my house. At this stage I need a helping hand, but unfortunately I am a person who have hands but without a helping hand. Why it happens in life? Why?