LONDON: Gus Atkinson completed a memorable match by taking five wickets as England thrashed Sri Lanka by 190 runs in the second Test at Lord’s on Sunday to take an unassailable 2-0 lead in a three-match series. Sri Lanka, set what would have been a new Test record fourth-innings winning total of 483, were dismissed for 292 after tea on the fourth day despite fifties from Dinesh Chandimal (58), Dimuth Karunaratne (55) and captain Dhananjaya de Silva (50). Fast bowler Gus Atkinson, who scored his maiden first-class hundred in England’s first innings 427, led the attack with 5-62. That meant…
Author: Hasnain Abid Khanzada
RAWALPINDI: Just when Pakistan felt they were on the top, Bangladesh fought back. Putting up a show of resilience, the visitors rose from absolute shambles to strong position in the second Test here at the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium on Sunday. Early on the second day of the contest, pacer Khurram Shehzad had left Bangladesh reeling at 26-6 in response to Pakistan’s first innings total of 274. But what followed was a counter-punching 165-run partnership between Mehidy Hasan Miraz and Litton Das — who scored a fighting century to minimise the deficit to just 12 runs, also thanks to his ninth-wicket…
Bangladesh were 37 without loss at tea in their chase of 185 to win the second Test, after pace bowlers Hasan Mahmud and Nahid Rana shared nine wickets to demolish Pakistan in Rawalpindi on Monday. Hasan finished with 5-43 while Nahid grabbed 4-44 — both career-best figures — to dismiss Pakistan for 172 in their second innings, giving the visitors a sniff of a 2-0 series win. Bangladesh lead the two-match series 1-0 after winning the first Test, also in Rawalpindi, last week. At the break, openers Zakir Hasan and Shadman Islam were at the crease with 27 and eight respectively,…
China has warned of severe economic retaliation against Japan if it further restricts sales and servicing of chipmaking equipment to Chinese firms, Bloomberg News reported on Monday, citing people familiar with the matter. Toyota Motor privately told Japanese officials that Beijing could react to the curbs by cutting Japan’s access to minerals required for automotive production, the report said. Several Chinese officials had repeatedly outlined the position with their Japanese counterparts in recent meetings, the report added. China’s foreign ministry said the country has always been firmly opposed to the “artificial disruption” of global production and supply chain stability, the politicisation of normal economic and…
ISLAMABAD: A Pakistani delegation, comprising judges of superior and district judiciary and senior law officers, during their visit to the US, told the stakeholders that Pakistani legal system was quite safe for foreign investors. Headed by Supreme Court Justice Shahid Waheed, the delegates added that Pakistan pays special focus on Alternate Dispute Resolution (ADR) as well. The delegation returned to Islamabad on Sunday after completing their visit to the US to attend a conference on ADR. The weeklong conference was organised by US Department of Commerce Commercial Law Development Program (CLDP). The Pakistani delegation attended the conference to strengthen confidence…
ISLAMABAD: The Auditor General of Pakistan (AGP) has highlighted serious financial irregularities, non-transparent procurements and unauthorised expenditures within various formations of the defence services, calling on the relevant authorities to improve internal controls and initiate inquiries to fix responsibility. In its audit report on the accounts of Defence Services for the audit year 2023-24, the AGP published more than 300 pages of audit objections, including non-recoveries, over and advance payments, procurement-related irregularities, losses to the state and the non-production of records. The report noted that the Ministry of Defence receives a single-line budgetary grant, which is distributed among the Ministry of Defence Production, Services…
ISLAMABAD: The federal government on Sunday claimed to have given “due weightage” to the recommendations given by economist Dr Kaiser Bengali and reviewed six federal ministries and its allied departments for rightsizing in the “first phase”. The explanation from the government a day after Dr Bengali announced his resignation from the austerity committee, the rightsizing committee, and the government expenditure committee, in letters sent to Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb and Cabinet Secretary Kamran Ali Afzal. Mentioning that the government did not appear committed to implementing the committees’ recommendations, which included abolishing 17 divisions and 50 departments, Dr Bengali cited dissatisfaction with the…
Pakistan’s consumer price index (CPI) in August rose 9.6 per cent year-on-year (YoY), marking a 34 month-low, data from the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) showed on Monday. The CPI measures household inflation and includes statistics about price change for categories of household expenditure. “CPI general inflation increased to 9.6pc on year-on-year basis in August 2024 as compared to an increase of 11.1pc in the previous month and 27.4pc in August 2023,” PBS said. The monthly inflation rate was 0.39pc, the PBS said. According to Karachi-based brokerage firm, Topline Securities, the reading for August “is at 34 months low”. “This takes 2MFY25…
ISLAMABAD: One-third of the total global child population, 766 million, were exposed to extreme heatwaves between July 2023 and June 2024 as temperatures hit new record highs, said a report released by international non-governmental organisation ‘Save the Children’. The body working for children’s rights said during the same period, 344m children experienced the highest temperature recorded in their location since at least 1980, the report said. Heatwaves also disrupt education through school closures and decreased learning. In April and May 2024, more than 210m children missed out on their school days due to extreme heat. In Punjab, at least 26m children or…
KARACHI: The traffic police have extracted a whopping Rs1.2 billion from the people of Karachi in the head of fines over different traffic violations during the past one year, it has emerged. Official data suggested that from July 1, 2023 to the end of July in 2024 over two million Karachiites had been issued tickets and the total amount of fine stood at Rs1,294,886,450 — which is around Rs3.5 million per day. Of the total Rs1.2bn fine amount, the citizens have paid Rs1.19bn, while 114,142 violators of traffic rules are yet to pay over Rs100m in fines. This year alone…
