'Dilip Kumar and Peshawar are inseparable': Pakistani city remembers great son of the soil

A man reads a sign, placed by the Archaeology and Museums Department, on a closed entrance of the childhood home of Bollywood actor Dilip Kumar after his death in Mumbai, in Peshawar, Pakistan July 7, 2021. (REUTERS)
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Updated 07 July 2021
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'Dilip Kumar and Peshawar are inseparable': Pakistani city remembers great son of the soil

  • The Bollywood star was born in Peshawar in 1922 before his family moved to India where he earned fame in Hindi cinema
  • At least two dozen people gathered outside Kumar’s former residence in Peshawar to offer funeral prayers in absentia

PESHAWAR: Hours after the death of legendary Bollywood actor Dilip Kumar in India on Wednesday, condolences poured in from his city of birth, Peshawar, in northwestern Pakistan where residents mourned a “great loss” to the region’s film industry and at least two dozen people gathered outside the star's former residence to offer funeral prayers in absentia.
Born as Mohammed Yusuf Khan in Peshawar in Pakistan's present-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on December 11, 1922, Kumar died in Mumbai after prolonged illness at the age of 98. He has been hailed as a “tragedy king” by a generation of cinema-goers for his soulful roles on the silver screen, and is widely considered one of the greatest actors in the history of Hindi cinema. 
Kamran Bangash, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s information minister, expressed sorrow over the actor's passing in a video message and said Kumar had a "matchless" love for his city of birth.
“The people of Peshawar are praying for him and will never forget his services,” Bangash said. “The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa administration will build an open museum at his house in Mohala Khudadad in Peshawar to ensure that the bond between Peshawar and Yousaf Khan remains alive forever.”




A condolence banner put up by Directorate of Archaeology and Museums, Govt. of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, at the ancestral house of legendary Dilip Kumar on his demise in Peshawar on July 7, 2021. (Photo courtesy: Social Media) 

Earlier this year, the provincial administration had approved a budget to buy the dilapidated ancestral homes of Bollywood legends Dilip Kumar and Raj Kapoor and turn them into museums. The two houses are located in Qissa Khwani Bazaar, Peshawar's oldest and famous “market of storytellers.” 
The families of the two stars moved to present-day India before Pakistan came into being in August 1947.
The current owner of Kumar’s house was planning to demolish it to build a commercial center but the archaeology department stopped the process last September, citing the Antiquity Act 2016, which prompted the late Indian actor to turn to Twitter and request the residents of Peshawar to share photographs of his former residence.




The combination of photos shows ancestral house of the Bollywood actor, Dilip Kumar, in Peshawar, Pakistan. (Photo courtesy: Ali Jan shared by @Oldpeshawar/Twitter) 

“Peshawar will miss its legendary son Yousaf Khan,” Dr. Abdul Samad, director of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Archaeology and Museums Department, told Arab News. “He played a pivotal role in bringing Bollywood to its climax through a lifetime of contributions.”
Asmat Shah, a senior journalist, said the people of Peshawar had received the news of Kumar’s death with “great grief.”
“Dilip Kumar and Peshawar are inseparable since the former had once lived here,” he said. “People in the crowded localities of this city have always held the Bollywood legend in great esteem.”

 

 

Jalil Ahmad, a local who lives close to Kumar’s former house in Peshawar, told Arab News the people of the congested Qissa Khwani locality were deeply grieved to learn about Kumar’s death.
“I saw people at tea stalls who were only discussing Dilip Kumar this morning,” he said. “We have all been praying for his departed soul and are eager to visit his residence in Peshawar once it is turned into a museum.”
Ahmed paused and said: “This will keep him alive in our hearts forever.”




People pray for late Bollywood actor Dilip Kumar, who died today in Mumbai at the age of 98, outside his ancestral home in Peshawar on July 7, 2021. (AFP)

At least two dozen residents of Kumar’s former neighborhood gathered for funeral prayers in absentia outside his home and also lit candles in remembrance. 
“We offered funeral prayers in absentia for the late Kumar whom many still consider their neighbor,” said shopkeeper Ali Zaman as he lit a candle. “We decided that as a neighbor, late Yousaf Khan has the right that we remember him and pray for his departed soul.”


China, Pakistan discuss advancement of rail, road and economic zone projects under CPEC

Updated 10 sec ago
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China, Pakistan discuss advancement of rail, road and economic zone projects under CPEC

  • The discussions included sections of Main Line-1 railway project, Karakoram Highway as well as Gwadar port and economic zone
  • Beijing has invested over $65 billion in energy, infrastructure and other projects as part of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor

ISLAMABAD: China and Pakistan on Thursday discussed advancement of key infrastructure and economic projects under the multi-billion-dollar China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), the Pakistani government said, with the two sides also discussing security of Chinese nationals working in Pakistan.
CPEC, a part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, aims to connect China to the Arabian Sea through a network of roads, railways, pipelines and ports in Pakistan and help Islamabad expand and modernize its economy.
The discussions on key CPEC projects were held during Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan Jiang Zaidong’s meeting with Pakistani Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal, according to Pakistan’s Press Information Department (PID).
On the occasion, the Pakistani planning minister emphasized the need for concrete mechanisms to ensure smooth and effective implementation of bilateral projects.
“Both sides deliberated on advancing key projects, including the Karachi-Hyderabad section of Main Line-1 (ML-1) and Karakoram Highway (Thakot-Raikot Section) project, and agreed to accelerate the projects’ timely execution,” the PID said in a statement.
“Regarding the Gwadar Port and Free Zone, both sides expressed a mutual commitment to ensuring the continued development of Gwadar in a holistic manner.”
The meeting came two days after a security guard at a factory in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi shot and injured two Chinese nationals before fleeing, police said.
Last month, two Chinese nationals were killed in a suicide bombing near the international airport in Karachi. In March this year, a suicide bombing killed five Chinese engineers and a Pakistani driver in northwestern Pakistan as they headed to the Dasu Dam, the biggest hydropower project in the country. In 2022, three Chinese educators and their Pakistani driver were killed when an explosion ripped through a van at the University of Karachi. A blast on a bus killed 13 people in north Pakistan in 2021, including nine Chinese nationals.
China, breaking with tradition, publicly spoken out against security threats to its workers and nationals living in Pakistan, where hundreds of them work on Beijing-funded projects linked to CPEC.
Iqbal assured the Chinese ambassador the safety of Chinese citizens was a top priority of his government.
“Pakistan will continue working closely with China to ensure the security of Chinese citizens, projects, and institutions,” he was quoted as saying by the PID.
Ambassador Jiang expressed gratitude for Pakistan’s comprehensive engagement and said the Chinese side was ready for collaboration in areas of agriculture, mines and minerals, industrial cooperation, according to the PID.
Iqbal shared that his ministry was in coordination with the National Development and Reform Commission of China to arrange high-level workshops to bring together experts from both sides to outline the future direction of CPEC’s second phase.
China has lately shown willingness for the second phase of CPEC and has given assurances for the establishment of five new corridors, including that of growth, livelihood, innovation, green economy and open regional inclusive development.
 


Pakistan to press developed nations for unconditional climate funding at COP29

Updated 55 min 50 sec ago
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Pakistan to press developed nations for unconditional climate funding at COP29

  • Pakistan is ranked as the 5th most vulnerable country to climate change, according to the Global Climate Risk Index
  • Pakistan PM’s aide Romina Khurshid Alam says vulnerable countries are suffering from their own economic challenges

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan will urge developed countries attending the upcoming Conference of the Parties (COP29) in Baku to fulfill their pledges and provide easy access to climate funding without attaching conditions, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s coordinator on climate change said on Thursday.

The COP29 climate conference, scheduled to take place in Baku between November 11 and 22, will layout new policies and bring together representatives from various nations to discuss the adverse impacts of climate change and evaluate available solutions for adaptation.

Pakistan is ranked as the 5th most vulnerable country to climate change, according to the Global Climate Risk Index. In 2022, devastating floods affected over 33 million people and caused economic losses exceeding $30 billion, highlighting the country’s high susceptibility to extreme weather events.

“Pakistan is very clear on our stance that we need all the developed countries when it comes to the pledges, one, they need to complete their pledges, they need to fulfil their pledges, and two, easy access toward the fundings,” Romina Khurshid Alam, PM Sharif’s coordinator on climate change, told Arab News in an exclusive interview.

Due to the rising temperatures, extreme climatic phenomena, including floods, droughts, cyclones, torrential rainstorms and heatwaves, have been occurring more frequently and with greater intensity across Pakistan.

The South Asian country is among the most severely threatened countries in terms of climate–induced challenges, especially in the context of its dependency on climate-sensitive sectors such as agriculture, water, natural resources and the environment, and socio-economic issues such as poverty. The country’s adaptation to the adverse impacts of climate change is inevitable and likely to become critical in the future.

Alam said vulnerable countries were suffering from their own economic challenges and vulnerabilities, while at the same time, many countries faced additional restraints on climate funding.

“It’s not fair that we always get demands to ‘do more and to do this, to do that, these sanctions are coming,’ that is something which is on the human rights violation as well,” she said, adding that Pakistan wanted to raise its voice on what happened to the pledges, how many countries benefited from them and what straightforward mechanisms could be pursued to provide effective support.

Asked about the total amount pledged by developed nations, Alam said she would provide the exact figure after COP29, but noted that “the number is very low.”

“At COP29, we are talking about the data bank system like in a way that what countries are suffering and looking forward for the carbon credits policies,” she added.

Last month, Pakistan proposed the establishment of a regional climate data bank to help Vulnerable Twenty (V20) group of countries prepare an evidence-based response to climate disasters.

Alam said the South Asian country had planned “many things” to showcase at Pakistan Pavilion during COP29.

Speaking about the prevailing smog issue, she said Pakistan would take it up with the Indian team at COP29.

“We are open to dialogues and open to come up with the solution, we want to get the things done by dialogue,” she said, noting that the chief minister of Pakistan’s Punjab, Maryam Nawaz, had also urged India to sit together to resolve this issue.

“CM Punjab very clearly said that ‘let’s sit together to sort out this issue because this cannot be done in a way that we are not doing this or you are doing this’,” Alam said.

“This is not a game, the main thing is to think about the children and to think about the future.”

Winter smog has become an annual crisis in Pakistan’s Punjab, particularly the provincial capital of Lahore, with air quality deteriorating to hazardous levels each season. The city consistently ranks among the world’s worst for air pollution, leading to a significant rise in respiratory issues and hospital admissions, especially affecting children and the elderly.

Last year, severe pollution levels prompted a surge in cases of asthma, lung infections and other respiratory problems among residents, according to media reports.

The problem this week prompted Punjab CM Nawaz to propose cross-border cooperation with Indian authorities to tackle shared pollution sources, such as crop residue burning, which exacerbate the region’s smog problem.


Pakistan PM performs groundbreaking of first private sector university in Gilgit-Baltistan

Updated 08 November 2024
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Pakistan PM performs groundbreaking of first private sector university in Gilgit-Baltistan

  • Ramday University is being built by a trust with construction set to complete by donations from overseas Pakistanis
  • Home to some of the world’s tallest mountains, semi-autonomous GB region is among Pakistan’s least developed areas

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif this week laid the foundation stone of first private sector university in Gilgit-Baltistan (GB), promising a bright future for the youth of the remote mountainous region.

Home to some of the tallest mountains in the world, the semi-autonomous GB region is counted among the least developed areas administered by Pakistan.

Ramday University is located in Thagos area of GB’s Ghanche district at an altitude of 11,000 feet. The university is being built on a 200-kanal area of land under a trust, with construction set to be completed through the donations of overseas Pakistanis, the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan reported.

GB-based news portal Pamir Times said the university will offer specialized programs in environmental studies, climate change, hydrology and mineral studies subjects.

“The establishment of an institution of higher learning in a remote area like Ghanche in Gilgit-Baltistan is highly encouraging,” Sharif was quoted as saying on by the APP during the groundbreaking ceremony in Islamabad on Thursday.

The prime minister congratulated former Supreme Cour judge Khalil ur Rehman Ramday on establishing the university.

“He expressed his confidence that this university, located at an altitude of 11,000 feet in Thagos, will reach the peak of modern knowledge and research standards,” the APP said.

Sharif stressed that GB’s development and the welfare of its people were among the government’s top priorities.

The development takes place a day after Sharif visited the mountainous northern region, where he inaugurated a model village for flood-affected families during a day-long visit to Ghizer.

There, Sharif pledged to provide residents with ownership documents to help them acquire new houses that were destroyed by the 2022 floods.


Father accused of murder of British-Pakistani girl blames stepmother

Updated 08 November 2024
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Father accused of murder of British-Pakistani girl blames stepmother

  • Sara Sharif was found dead in her bed in southwest of London in Aug. 2023 with injuries including broken bones, burns
  • Her father, Urfan Sharif, had fled to Pakistan a day before the body was found, along with his wife and the girl’s uncle

LONDON: The father of a 10-year-old British-Pakistani girl on Thursday denied her murder and instead blamed the girl’s stepmother, calling her “evil” and “psycho.”

Sara Sharif was found dead in her bed in Woking, southwest of London, on August 10, 2023 with injuries including broken bones, burns and bite marks.

Her father, Urfan Sharif, 42, had fled to Pakistan a day before the body was found, along with his wife Beinash Batool, 30, and the girl’s uncle, Faisal Malik, 29.

Sharif then called police in the UK shortly after arriving in Islamabad and said he had “beat her up too much.” During the trial, Sharif said he made up this and another confession to “protect my family.”

All three adults were arrested upon their return to the UK a month later. They deny charges of murder and allowing the death of a child.

Details of the extent of Sara’s injuries have been detailed at London’s Old Bailey court, including claims from Batool that Sharif would beat his daughter badly.

Giving evidence for a third day, Sharif admitted slapping Sara “multiple times” but denied beating, burning, or biting her, insisting that he was “never at home” when she was injured.

Sharif broke down when his lawyer, Naeem Mian, questioned him about beating Sara, who was home schooled, with a cricket bat.

The taxi driver denied burning his daughter with an iron and instead said he was “made to” slap Sara by Batool, who constantly accused the girl of behaving badly.

Pointing to Batool sitting in the dock, Sharif shouted: “I should not have believed her... I didn’t realize I’m living with evil and a psycho.”

He also suggested that Batool was the one who bit her “like an animal.”

The jury was previously told that Sharif and Malik had provided their dental impressions but Batool had refused.

“I didn’t do it. Faisal didn’t do it. Who else was at home?” Sharif said.

He denied ever being aware of Sara being in pain. “She never told me that,” he said and indicated that he did not see injuries because Sara wore full-sleeve tops and long bottoms as well as a hijab head covering.

In the month leading up to Sara’s death, Mian said Sharif was out of the house at work from early in the morning to late at night while holing frequent telephone conversations with Batool, who would largely be at home.

Sharif wept as he recalled a time he came home and saw that Sara’s hands had been tied behind her back with brown packaging tape, accusing Batool of the act.

Asked why he did not call the police or ask Batool to leave, Sharif said that his wife was “manipulative” and that he believed her apology.

“I have been an idiot,” he added.

Forensic evidence shown to court included bundles of packaging tape and a white plastic carrier bag fashioned into a hood that could have been used on Sara’s head.

The bag had packaging tape stuck to it as well as long, brown hairs that matched Sara’s DNA, the court was told.

Both the bag and the non-sticky side of the tape had fingerprints that matched Sharif’s, who denied fashioning a hood out of the plastic bag or using it on Sara.

He said the fingerprints could be a result of him handling the items while sorting the garbage.

Sharif had previously accused Batool of being abusive toward him and preventing him from asking Sara about how she obtained her injuries.

In 2022, Batool texted her sister that Sharif had suggested using make-up to cover up bruises after beating Sara, to which the sister replied: “LOL it was going to happen you can tell.”

In the days before her death, Sharif said Sara, who did chores around the house, had asked him to “not go to work.”


Pakistan win toss, bowl in 2nd ODI against Australia

Updated 08 November 2024
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Pakistan win toss, bowl in 2nd ODI against Australia

  • The hosts lead 1-0 after a tense two-wicket win in Melbourne on Monday
  • Pakistan named unchanged side with fast bowler Naseem Shah declared fit

ADELAIDE: Pakistan skipper Mohammad Rizwan won the toss and opted to bowl in the second of a three-game one-day series against Australia in Adelaide on Friday.

The hosts lead 1-0 after a tense two-wicket win in Melbourne on Monday.

Pakistan named an unchanged side with fast bowler Naseem Shah declared fit after leaving the field during the first match, apparently with cramp.

Australia made one change with veteran Josh Hazlewood returning in place of Sean Abbott to join his long-time pace partners Pat Cummins and Mitchell Starc.

Jake Fraser-McGurk and Matt Short again open the batting in the absence of Mitchell Marsh and Travis Head and will be keen to make their mark after falling cheaply in the opening match.

Teams

Australia: Matt Short, Jake Fraser-McGurk, Steve Smith, Josh Inglis, Marnus Labuschagne, Glenn Maxwell, Aaron Hardie, Pat Cummins (capt), Mitchell Starc, Adam Zampa, Josh Hazlewood

Pakistan: Saim Ayub, Abdullah Shafique, Babar Azam, Mohammad Rizwan (capt), Kamran Ghulam, Agha Salman, Irfan Khan, Shaheen Shah Afridi, Naseem Shah, Haris Rauf, Mohammad Hasnain