Author: Waleed Hassan

An estimated trillion dollars worth of minerals are in Afghanistan including rare earth metals which are required in electric vehicles and other technologies of the future. Pakistan must not be just a transit trade route for these minerals, it must have much greater economic interests. We must appreciate the armed forces and security agencies for protecting national security and securing an excellent strategic position in Afghanistan. However we must urge the establishment to stop continuously using the CPEC buzzword without defining Pakistan’s economic interests. Pakistan should become the hub for refining and processing these minerals and then exporting them onwards…

Zubair Ali Khan, a PTI supporter from Karachi is actively catching dozens of businesses who aren’t paying taxes. He has so far been able to register 49 businesses for either Sales Tax or FBR POS Linked system. The businesses range from restaurants, marts, hospitals, doctors, traders, saloons and bakeries. His actions shame FBR and provincial tax officials who are failing to go after tax evaders. The Prime Minister and Finance Minister have pledged to reform the ‘rotten FBR’ but so far there is little progress. The bottleneck seems to be corrupt and incompetent tax officials who are difficult to remove…

The higher education development budget for Punjab is Rs15bn this financial year, an increase of around 285% compared to the previous year. However, the focus of the development budget is to build new universities across many districts of Punjab. This is a bad move as the limited allocation should instead be used to improve existing universities which have very poor standards. Employers across many industries complain of the substandard quality of graduates who do not posses the skills required for jobs. This is a huge impediment to economic growth as not only does it hurt domestic businesses, it also fails…

The trailer for a new TV series called ‘Dhoop Ki Dewaar’ jointly produced by Indian and Pakistani teams has undermined Pakistan’s state narrative and whitewashed the Indian occupation of Kashmir. The script for the show was okayed by the ISPR in January 2019, a month before Indian border tension started. There is anger amongst Pakistanis online was visible as many were calling it ‘Aman Ki Asha 2.0’. With continuing ethnic cleaning and demographic change in Kashmir, people are questioning if it is right for the ISPR backed TV show to be white washing the Indian army. A defence analyst stated…

Policies which could help the government of Pakistan develop the Electric Vehicle industry.