Saturday, April 14, 2012
Friday, March 30, 2012
Beautiful Pakistan! (Gilgit Baltistan )
Real beauty of Pakistan is Gilgit baltistan! The Land of Baltit people.Its like heave on Earth.Long live Pakistan.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Butt, Asif found guilty of spot-fixing
Former Test captain Butt, 27, and fast bowler Asif, 28, face jail after a court in London convicted them of deliberately bowling three no-balls during the Lord's Test in August 2010 as part of a "spot-fixing" betting scam.
The verdicts are a scalp from beyond the grave for Britain's News of the World tabloid, which uncovered the conspiracy but was shut down by owner Rupert Murdoch this year amid a scandal over phone-hacking.
Prosecutors alleged Butt and Asif conspired with British agent Mazher Majeed and Pakistan fast bowler Mohammad Aamer to bowl the no-balls as part of a plot that revealed "rampant corruption" at the heart of international cricket.
Butt faces up to seven years in prison jail after the jury at Southwark Crown Court convicted him of conspiracy to obtain or accept corrupt payments, and conspiracy to cheat at gambling.
Asif was found guilty of conspiring to accept corrupt payments in a "spot-fixing" betting scam. The 28-year-old was also found guilty by the jury at Southwark Crown Court on a separate count of conspiring to cheat at gambling. The corrupt payment charge carries a maximum sentence of seven years' imprisonment.
They are expected to be sentenced later this week.
Butt and Asif had pleaded not guilty and they sat in silence in the dock as the jury delivered their verdicts, after spending nearly 17 hours in deliberations over four days.
Majeed, 36, and Aamer, 19, were also charged with the same offences but were not standing trial alongside Butt and Asif.
Mohammad Aamer pleaded guilty to involvement in a spot-fixing betting scam before the trial of his teammates. Aamer pleaded guilty to conspiracy to cheat and conspiracy to accept corrupt payments at a pre-trial hearing on September 16.
In a further twist, Butt's wife gave birth to a baby boy just 30 minutes before the verdict was delivered, his father said by telephone from Pakistan's eastern city of Lahore. Butt already has one daughter.
During the three-week trial the jury heard that vast sums of money could be made by rigging games for betting syndicates, particularly in South Asia, and that the problem was theatening the game of cricket.
Mazher Mahmood, News of the World's former investigations editor, known as the "fake sheikh" for his disguises, told the court he had approached Majeed pretending to be an Indian businessman.
Majeed claimed he had at least six Pakistani players working for him and that it would cost between £50,000 and £80,000 ($78,000 and $125,000) to fix a "bracket", where bets are made on incidents during a given period of play.
But the cost of rigging a whole result was far more, at £400,000 for a Twenty20, £450,000 for a one-day international, and £1 million for Test matches, Majeed allegedly told the reporter.
The agent was secretly filmed accepting £150,000 in cash from the journalist as part of an arrangement to bowl the no-balls, and recorded allegedly making arrangements with Butt for the no balls.
Butt told the court he had ignored his agent's requests to fix games and had no knowledge of the plan to bowl no balls, while admitting that he had failed in his duty to inform cricketing authorities of Majeed's approach.
Asif meanwhile said he had bowled a no ball at the exact time the agent had predicted to the News of the World journalist because Butt had told him to run faster moments before his delivery.
The team's manager during the fateful tour of England when the scam was uncovered, Yawar Saeed, said Pakistan cricket had been badly tarnished by the case.
"I feel very sad because I tried my level best to tell them to keep away from notorious people. They should have understood that and they committed a blunder, and when you commit a blunder, you are punished," Saeed said.
"I'm also sad because the country's name has been dragged into this entire controversy. Pakistan is known for its talented players but this case has stained the country's image badly," he added.
The case is the worst in international cricket since that of South Africa's Hansie Cronje a decade ago.
Cronje was banned for life in 2000 after it was revealed he accepted money from bookmakers in a bid to influence the course of games as well as trying to corrupt his team-mates. He died in a plane crash in 2002. (AFP)
Monday, October 31, 2011
An Estimate of the gathering at Imran Khan's Jalsa !
We begin a new Pakistan from today: Imran
In his address to the cheering crowd that turned up in tens of thousands at ‘Pakistan Bachao’ call of TI Chief Imran Khan here at Minar-e-Pakistan, the cricketer turned politician also warned that he would go to the Supreme Court as well as the Election Commission of Pakistan if the politicians in the government and opposition failed to declare their assets as required under the Pakistan law.
He said Tehreek-e-Insaf would set up a cell to investigate and identify politicians who declare assets and those who do not.
Starting his speech following the National Anthem, Imran Khan gave his party’s programme in detail which, he said, aimed at making Pakistan a peaceful and independent country where investment would be attracted from across the world. “We will make Pakistan a place where people come from other countries to seek jobs.”
Talking of change, he said: “ Today we are beginning a new Pakistan from Minar-e-Pakistan, the place from where founder of the Nation Quad-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah began his movement”.
Spelling out his party’s manifesto in connection with Pakistan’s relations with the US, the Tehreek-e-Insaf Chief said ‘we will make friends with you (US) but not be your slave; we will help you (US) withdraw from Afghanistan but won’t launch any military operation (for you).’
He questioned that if US, being the super power, could not win the war through military means how could Pakistan?
“We will strengthen ties with China,” he said, adding, he was leaving for China on its government’s invitation tonight.
He said Pakistan was not a poor country; ‘it is very rich in natural resources’. Pakistan has 180 billion tonnes of coal reserves which means we can export electricity to the world, he added.
Imran Khan said Pakistan never needed to beg before others. “Pakistan will never beg again; Imran Khan will die but won’t beg,” he vowed amid vociferous cheers of the charged crowd.
Coming down hard on President Asif Ali Zardari, Imran Khan questioned how could Asif Zardari provide bread, cloth and shelter when under his rule 1600 people committed suicide.
He also claimed that ‘Asif Zardari’ wrote a letter to the US requesting it to please save him from the army because he was not able to serve them well with army interefernce.
He regretted that Mian (Nawaz Sharif) sahib should have done better than coming up with a show of ‘Patwaris’ the other day in Lahore.
Imran Khan said Pakistan was suffering a loss of Rs3000 billions per year mainly due to rampant corruption.
He said his party also aimed to bring about police reforms in the country to improve the working of this institution. “We will depoliticize police and then get the SHO elected like the way it is done in America,” he added.
He said condition of the villages will be improved and pledged to bring an end to military operation and target killings in Balochistan, which, he termed as a province rich in natural resources.. “We will make Balochis our brothers,” he added.
Criticising Pakistan Muslim League-N Nawaz Sharif, he said: “How can you fight with Zardari when you can’t even fight with mosquitoes?”
Pointing to the crowd, he said, Asif Zardar and Nawaz Sharif cannot stop this flood now. “This is not just a flood it is a Tsunami and anyone who tries to stand before it will be washed away.”
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