August 28, 2023

ISLAMABAD/KARACHI/PESHAWAR  –  Caretaker Prime Minister An­waarul Haq Kakar Saturday summoned an emergency meet­ing on Sunday (today) over the price of electricity and consum­ers’ bills. The prime minister also directed the ministry of energy and the power distributions companies to present detailed briefing over the issue, PM Of­fice Media Wing said in a press release on Saturday. The meet­ing would mull over provision of maximum relief to the mass­es over electricity bills. Separate­ly, on his X handle, the prime min­ister posted that he summoned an emergency meeting over these is­sues in the PM House and would hold consultations to provide max­imum relief to power consumers. The inflated power bills trig­gered nationwide protests, in­cluding Lahore, Karachi, Rawal­pindi, Multan, Gujranwala, and Peshawar. In Karachi, the Ja­maat-e-Islami held demonstra­tions at multiple places against the skyrocketing increase in power bills and what it said overcharging on part of the K-Electric (KE). In Rawalpin­di, protesters gathered at Com­mittee Chowk and burned bills while demanding that the gov­ernment abolish imposed taxes on electricity. Also in Peshawar, power consumers called the in­crease in electricity bills unbear­able and demanded immediate relief from the government. In Gujranwala, Protesters sur­rounded the Gujranwala Elec­tric Power Company office in protest against expensive elec­tricity. Protests were also held in other cities, including Narow­al, Attock, Sargodha, and Har­ipur, against high power bills. The protests in Multan were emotionally charged. They tied their electricity bills to donkeys as they marched towards the Gujranwala Electric Power Com­pany (Gepco) while chanting slogans against the government. Traders and citizens also in different cities held pro­test demonstrations on Friday against the rising cost of elec­tricity amid growing inflation­ary pressure, warning the gov­ernment to be prepared to face the “consequences” if did not address the issue that was con­sistently adding to the cost of living in the country. The protests began after Pa­kistan’s National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) increased the tariffs by Rs4.96 per unit last month, a condition set by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for approving a short-term $3 billion bailout package for the South Asian state. NEPRA periodically adjusts consumer-end tariffs after get­ting input from distribution companies which suggest differ­ent rates calculated on the basis of their revenue requirements. “We warn the government that if the decision to increase elec­tricity prices is not withdrawn immediately, the consequences will be borne by the incompe­tent rulers,” Muhammad Kashif Chaudhry, President of Marka­zi Tanzeem-e-Tajran Pakistan, a central association of traders in the country, said in a statement. He added the business commu­nity had launched a string of protests against the electricity price hike and were planning to gradually spread the movement nationwide. “We had already warned the rulers of this country not to become a tool of the inter­national financial institutions by implementing anti-people pol­icies,” Chaudhry said. He main­tained people residing in differ­ent cities, towns and villages had started pouring into the streets and were burning their electric­ity bills, adding it was their way of expressing “rebellion.” Meanwhile, speaking to the participants of the demonstra­tion in Karachi, Atiq Mir, Chair­man of All Karachi Tajir Ithehad (AKTI), highlighted that when traders and businessmen were compelled to protest on the streets, it signaled a “genuine economic crisis in the country.” Hafiz Naeem-ur-Rehman, the JI chief, said criticised the gov­ernment for initially increas­ing petrol prices before raising the cost of electricity costs. He pointed out it had become chal­lenging for the common citizen to meet basic requirements. In the last 30 days, the govern­ment twice raised the fuel prices under a fortnightly cost adjust­ment mechanism, leading to an all-time high with over 15 per­cent hike. Traders underscored the recent increase in fuel and power prices, coupled with spi­raling inflation, had severely hampered their business activi­ties. Inflation in country reached a historic peak of 38 percent in May before easing to 28.3 per­cent in July, though it continues to remain significantly elevated. Meanwhile, the former law­makers of Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) Saturday expressed concern over the hike in electricity bills,the prevalent problem of delayed bills and urged the gov­ernment to withdraw the recent hike in units. In a statement issued here on Saturday the former MNAs Sabir Hussain Qaimkhani and Salahuddin said besides making electricity very expensive, up to 10 to 12 hours of load shedding was also being carried out, af­fecting domestic, commercial and industrial consumers. They deplored that instead of ensuring that the meter read­ing of exactly, the meter readers of Hyderabad Electric Supply Company (HESCO) take read­ings of extra days. They reiterated that the com­plaints about the burnt or de­fective transformers were not timely addressed and the con­sumers had to pay from their pockets to get the tranformers repaired even though HESCO’s stated policy was that the com­pany was reposonsible for the repair and replacement. The legislators said the ex­pensive electricity at the time when the country and its peo­ple were reeling from inflation only multiplied woes of the people.They requested the gov­ernment to withdraw the re­cent hike in the price of units and to address the services re­lated issues of the power distri­bution companies like HESCO. Source:https://www.nation.com.pk/27-Aug-2023/inflated-electricity-bills-spark-nationwide-protests

France will ban children from wearing the abaya – the loose-fitting, full-length robe worn by some Muslim women – in state-run schools, the country’s education minister has said ahead of the back-to-school season. France, which has enforced a strict ban on religious signs in state schools since 19th-century laws removed any traditional Catholic influence from public education, has struggled to update guidelines to deal with a growing Muslim minority. end of list French public schools do not permit the wearing of large crosses, Jewish kippas or Islamic headscarves. In 2004, the country banned headscarves in schools, and in 2010, it passed a ban on full face veils in public, angering many in its five million-strong Muslim community. “I have decided that the abaya could no longer be worn in schools,” Education Minister Gabriel Attal said in an interview with TV channel TF1. “When you walk into a classroom, you shouldn’t be able to identify the pupils’ religion just by looking at them.” The move comes after months of debate over the wearing of abayas in French schools, where women have long been banned from wearing the hijab. The right and far right had pushed for the ban, which the left argued would encroach on civil liberties. Unlike headscarves, abayas occupied a grey area and faced no outright ban until now. The French Council of Muslim Faith (CFCM), a national body encompassing many Muslim associations, has said items of clothing alone were not “a religious sign”. Defending secularism is a rallying cry in France that resonates across the political spectrum, from left-wingers upholding the liberal values of the Enlightenment to far-right voters seeking a bulwark against the growing role of Islam in French society. Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/8/27/france-to-ban-wearing-abaya-dress-in-schools-minister

  Police in India are investigating a teacher after a video of her encouraging students to slap their 7-year-old classmate, who is Muslim, sparked widespread outrage in the country. The video of the incident, which took place in the Muzaffarnagar district in northern Uttar Pradesh state, shows the boy fearfully standing in front of his classmates as the teacher calls on students to hit him. The boy cries as his classmates take turns to slap him, while the teacher is heard telling the students to do it “properly.” A man can be heard laughing as the boy wails while the slapping continues. Muzaffarnagar’s superintendent of police, Satyanarayan Prajapat, on Friday said the teacher told students to hit the boy “for not remembering his times tables.” The teacher also referenced the boy’s religion, according to Prajapat. “The female teacher declared: ‘When the mothers of Mohammedan (one who follows Islam) students don’t pay attention to their children’s studies, their performance is ruined,” he said. Police in the district have registered a case against the teacher and an investigation is underway. The teacher has not been formally charged. District officials have also ordered the school to shut, according to CNN affiliate CNN News-18. CNN has reached out to Uttar Pradesh police officials for more details. The incident has caused widespread anger and upset in India, the world’s largest democracy of 1.4 billion, where the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Hindu nationalist policies have deepened the country’s communal tensions and created what rights groups and government critics say is an atmosphere of fear and alienation among minority groups. Prominent opposition politician Rahul Gandhi accused the teacher of “sowing the poison of discrimination in the minds of innocent children.” Writing on Twitter, now known as X, he said: “Turning a holy place like school into a market place of hatred – there is nothing worse than this that a teacher can do for the country.” Gandhi also blamed the BJP for stoking religious intolerance. “This is the same kerosene spread by the BJP which has set every corner of India on fire,” Gandhi wrote. “Children are the future of India – do not hate them, we all have to teach love together.” While the BJP has not responded to Gandhi’s comments, it has long maintained it does not discriminate against minorities and “treats all its citizens with equality.” During a trip to the United States in June, Prime Minister Narendra Modi told reporters there was “absolutely no space” for discrimination in India. Indian law does not have a statutory definition of corporal punishment targeting children, however physical punishment and mental harassment are prohibited under the country’s Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act. According to CNN News-18, the teacher claimed the 7-year-old’s father had asked her punish the child, adding that she was unable to do so because she is disabled and had therefore told the other students to discipline him. “His father brought the child in and said to straighten him out. Now because I can’t get up, I thought I’d get one or two children to hit him,” she said. The incident comes at a time of heightened communal tensions in the country as the BJP’s popular but divisive policies gain momentum in India. A study by economist Deepankar Basu noted a 786% increase in hate crimes against all minorities between 2014 and 2018, following the BJP’s election victory. Uttar Pradesh, where the incident took place, is India’s largest state of about 200 million. It boasts a religiously diverse population, where about 20% of its residents are Muslim. However, it remains among one of the most polarized of states in India. Its chief minister, the Hindu-monk-turned BJP politician Yogi Adityanath, has been criticized for his anti-Muslim rhetoric and Hindu-first policies, and the state has passed legislation critics say is rooted in “Hindutva” – the ideological bedrock of Hindu nationalism Source:https://edition.cnn.com/2023/08/28/india/india-muslim-student-slapped-teacher-video-intl-hnk/index.html