Pakistan Climbs Up Ranks for Sending SPAM

Pakistan has climbed up in the top 12 or “Dirty Dozen” ranking for sending SPAM emails.

Pakistan, which was last year ranked at 11th position, has now been ranked at 9th position with 3.3 percent share of total SPAM in the world.

These rankings have been established by experts at SophosLabs, who have released their latest “dirty dozen” report detailing the world’s top spam-relaying countries.

According to report, India has topped the ranks for sending SPAM beating United States of America and South Korea. India’s share for sending SPAM has risen to 9.3 percent of total SPAM being sent in the world.

The top twelve spam relaying countries for January – March 2012

1. India – 9.3%
2. USA – 8.3%
3. S Korea – 5.7%
4. Indonesia – 5.0%
5. Russia – 5.0%
6. Italy – 4.9%
7. Brazil – 4.3%
8. Poland – 3.9%
9. Pakistan – 3.3%
10. Vietnam – 3.2%
11. Taiwan – 2.9%
12. Peru – 2.5%
13. Other – 41.7%

Pakistan is considered SPAM heaven just because there’s no legislation available to deal with SPAM in any form or at any level. This is why even multinational companies were caught sending SPAM emails.

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Breaking: Link Dot Net Considering to Quit Operations in Pakistan

Link Dot Net, Orascom’s fully owned subsidiary for DSL broadband services and sister concerns of Mobilink, is considering to wrap up its operations in Pakistan, amid low returns and to shift the group focus on core cellular services and branchless banking.

Sources familiar with the development have confirmed ProPakistani that LDN has decided in principle to exit Pakistani market.

Link Dot Net has DSL operations and a WiMAX license through Dancom, which it might quit, told us a company official.

However, final decision is yet to come after annual board meeting of Pakistan Mobile Communication Limited, a company under which Orascom operates in Pakistan. Meeting is scheduled for May 15th, 2012 in Islamabad.

Another source in the company told ProPakistani that decision is yet to be made, hence nothing can be said as of now. But yes, group is considering an option to quit operations in Pakistan.

Orascom had bought World On Line and Dancom to offer DSL broadband services in Pakistan. Link Dot Net, after in operations, has been facing tough competition from PTCL, country’s largest DSL broadband service provider. In addition to competition, analysts say, LDN was victim of anti-competitive practices by the telecom giant.

Update:

Link Dot Net has a WiMAX license, we were just told, though Dancom, which it is considering to quit.

Mobilink Infinity won’t be impacted with the decision.

Source : ProPakistani

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Alter Bridge, Watch over you :)

Leaves are on the ground
Fall has come
Blue skies turning grey
Like my love

I tried to carry you
And make you whole
But it was never enough
I must go

[Chorus:]
Who is gonna save you
When I'm gone?
And who'll watch over you
When I'm gone?

You say you care for me
But hide it well
How can you love someone
And not yourself?

[Chorus]

And when I'm gone
Who will break your fall?
Who will you blame?

I can't go on
And let you lose it all
It's more than I can take
Who'll ease your pain?
Ease your pain

[Chorus:]
Who is gonna save you when I'm gone?
Who'll watch over you?
Who will give you strength when you're not strong.
Who'll watch over you when I've gone away?

Snow is on the ground
Winters come
You long to hear my voice
But I'm long gone

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PTA delays 3G licensing auction indefinitely

DUBAI: The auction to sell third-generation (3G) mobile telecoms licences in Pakistan has been indefinitely delayed, telecom operators told Reuters on Thursday.

The auction, if completed, would have raised a minimum of 630 million dollars for the country.

The auction of three 3G licences had been scheduled to be held on March 29, according to a January government memorandum, and would be open to the five existing mobile operators plus potential new entrants.

Potential bidders were due to submit expressions of interest from January 21, but they have yet not been invited to do so, Walid Irshaid, chief executive of Pakistan Telecommunication Co (PTCL), told Reuters.

“All the dates announced earlier have been put on hold, what the new date is we don’t know,” said Irshaid. “The first step was not even taken yet. No official notification has been received by us or any other operator.”

Former monopoly PTCL, an affiliate of United Arab Emirates’ Etisalat, is the third-ranked mobile operator, with a 19 per cent market share, behind Norway’s Telenor and Mobilink, a unit of Egypt’s Orascom Telecom, which respectively claim 25 and 30 per cent of Pakistan’s 116 million mobile subscribers.

A spokesman for Telenor said the government had postponed the auction until indefinitely until it hires an international consultant to supervise the process.

The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, which is running the auction, was not immediately available for comment.

The government, which is still owed $800 million by Etisalat as part of the UAE firm’s $2.6-billion acquisition of a 26 per cent stake in PTCL in 2006, expects to raise at least $630 million from the 3G auction, having set a base price of $210 million for each licence.

That would have raised much-needed money for Pakistan’s government, which battling doubled-digit inflation and a sharply widening trade deficit, while foreign investment into the country has also plunged.

Pakistan’s two other mobile operators are Warid Telecom – a joint venture between Abu Dhabi Group and SingTel Group – and China Mobile Communication Cooperation’s Zong.

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Punjab Youth Laptop Goes on Sale on OLX!

Just in case, if you weren’t bright enough to win Punjab’s Youth Laptop, or maybe you had graduated a year ago but still desperately want to have that sleek book in your hands – here’s the chance for you.

Just head towards OLX and search for youth laptop and bingo!

Following is the one of search result we got. The machine is available for Rs. 30,000. Users suggest a little bargain can bring the price down to 27-28K mark. Not a bad deal I would say.

We are also told that same machine is available in Lahore (Hafeez Center to be exact) at much lower price. They are talking about 20K or even low.

What I can see from here is that there gonna be plenty of such offerings in coming days. Just imagine, over 100,000 machines given away – an ultimate killer market gonna arise out of it. Nevertheless, laptop deals won’t be happy with all this.

Update: 

According to the undertaking, selling these laptops to anyone is not allowed, and if anyone found in violation of undertaking can become under the hammer of legal and administrative action from Punjab government.

Source : ProPakistani

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Collateral damage

THE younger brother of one of Osama bin Laden’s widows, Amal Abdulfattah, has filed a legal challenge in the Islamabad High Court against criminal cases filed against Ms Abdulfattah and five minor children of the Al Qaeda chief. From what the authorities have disclosed, they entered the country illegally. Perhaps the state believes that because of their proximity to the world’s most wanted man the family can provide crucial information. If this is the case, the authorities need to make it clear; otherwise it can be argued that these people are high-profile examples of the manner in which women and children in this shadowy war are written off as negligible collateral damage by militants who head households as well as the security network in pursuit.

In many cases, the militants jeopardise their families’ security by keeping them in the area of active operations. It is hard to imagine that the women and children have a choice in the matter. And when the men are targeted, via drones or bombs or raids, those affected include people whose crime was simply to be irrevocably tied to a suspected terrorist. Some argue that the militants’ intention is to use their families as human shields. Do those planning a strike against militants take such collateral damage into consideration? From the many examples, including that of Baitullah Mehsud’s wife who was killed along with her husband in a drone strike, it would appear not. The onus lies primarily on the men who drag their families with them. But military planners are not absolved of the moral responsibility for the death or victimisation of those who have no proven links with terrorism. The fate of Osama bin Laden’s family, then, becomes a litmus test. If the only charge against them is of illegal entry, the humanitarian answer lies in deportation.

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Economy update

THE State Bank’s mid-year report on the economy brings some good news. But it also raises areas of serious concern, raising doubts about the optimism with which the government has been talking about supposed improvements. The overall picture that emerges from the report is that several indicators that have improved — and that politicians have touted — are in fact at risk, and other indicators are worsening. Take inflation, for example. It finally dipped below 10 per cent in December, supported by better-than-expected agricultural output, but is expected to be back in the double digits by the end of the year. Or GDP growth: the SBP’s estimate of between three and four per cent for 2011-12 beats last year’s, but misses the target of above four per cent. The fiscal deficit has come down, but will be larger than planned for the year by one to two per cent of GDP.

A couple of developments over the last half-year have contributed to this scenario. For one, Pakistan’s external account position has worsened sharply. The prices of imports, especially oil, have pushed the trade balance into the red. Expected foreign inflows from such sources as American Coalition Support Funds, PTCL privatisation and 3G licence sales have not been realised. Send more money abroad than is coming home, and this sets off the expected chain reaction: a weaker rupee and increased domestic government borrowing (which more than doubled versus last year). Both have kept prices higher than they would otherwise be and will only make inflation worse in the months to come.

Some of these developments are beyond the government’s control. But what isn’t is the creation of a productive economy able to withstand these external shocks. Behind the broader statistics a picture emerges of an economy whose problems are deeper. The government did use up a large chunk of credit, but despite a falling interest rate, loans to the private sector in the first half of this year grew at a rate less than half of what it was a year ago. More worryingly, loans for investment were paid back by a larger amount than was borrowed last year. Pakistanis aren’t investing, and the SBP points to unsurprising factors: energy shortages, law and order, excess capacity. Some of the same reasons are behind the decline in textile exports. Political instability, corruption and law and order are leading to falling foreign investment. An economy that no one is investing in will grow slowly, yield lower taxes, continue to run a deficit and remain vulnerable to external developments. It is a vicious cycle, and short-term solutions will not be enough to break it.

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Long, hot summer

AS summer approaches, the country is mentally preparing itself for a long season of power outages and riots. On Tuesday, there were protests in many towns of Punjab including Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Toba Tek Singh and Sheikhupura. They were staged by industrial workers who had seen many of their colleagues dismissed from jobs because of the energy crisis. But domestic consumers are no less affected. A recent report in this paper said that, excluding those exempted from loadshedding, ‘ordinary’ Pakistanis were getting only 30 per cent of electricity against the demand of more than 14,000MW. There are areas which have electricity for 18 hours and there are those that don’t have it for the same length of time. The power ministry contests the figures, but the 50 per cent shortage that it does admit to is daunting enough and is making consumers dread the hotter months ahead when the electricity demand will be far greater.

The ministry admits there are exemptions — such as defence installations, VVIP connections and theoretically at least, hospitals. Hearing a case about the non-supply of electricity to hospitals, on Tuesday the Lahore High Court asked for the submission of an exemption schedule on April 2. The exempt list accounts for an estimated 2,000MW. Perhaps, it could do with a bit of revision for the benefit of all those who cannot help but come out shouting on the streets. Matters are painful enough at the moment, but the absence of a plan for the future is even more frustrating and leads to routine displays of violence by power rioters. The government had promised to end loadshedding within a few months after it came to power four years ago. Given the sensitivities of the PPP and the urge to provoke the government, the temptation is to equate the power promise with Gen Zia’s infamous vow of holding polls in 90 days. The power riots may have behind them some politicians wanting to embarrass the government, but it is a genuine issue on its own. Surely there is a case for linking the denial of energy to people with the government’s own grip on power.

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One man’s pension fund; hundreds educated

An amazing effort done by these individuals for the promotion of education in our society. If we will educate these children, tomorrow they will contribute for the betterment of this society. If a man can start such a project from his pension money, why cant some other people among us with a lot of money can go for such projects. I think its the time , we come out of this shell of inactivity and do some thing good and beneficial for our society. 

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No role in politics

ASLAM Bhootani should know better than to support the idea of the army’s continued involvement in politics. Talking to newsmen in Quetta on Monday, the Balochistan Assembly speaker said the army had a role in the province and that negotiations with the nationalist groups would not be successful unless the military force was involved. In fact such views appear out of place when one considers that the tension that had at one stage assumed the proportions of an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation between the government and the army has been tapering off. The prime minister’s statement in parliament in December that the army had become “a state within a state”, and the army’s warning of “grievous consequences” did not lead to a derailment of the democratic process as many feared at the time. Showing good sense both sides pulled back from the brink. While it may be true that the army’s role in Balochistan is a reality and that GHQ has its own views on the province, even if the intention is to develop a consensus between the people’s representatives and the generals on the Balochistan issue, backing a role for the army in politics can only prove to be counterproductive. One has only to revisit Pakistan’s own history to be convinced of this.

Democratic governments the world over listen to their generals on security matters. But by their very training, military leaders have a one-dimensional mind. On the other hand, an elected government is not worth its salt if it does not take a holistic view, which while accommodating the military’s suggestions is not oblivious to other equally vital matters. As finally formulated, the policy of a democratic government represents the views of all segments of the executive, including the military.

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Going forward

THE Parliamentary Committee on National Security’s recommendations on the US-Pakistan relationship contain at least one major new and positive suggestion and at least one significant sticking point. Perhaps the most promising change Senator Rabbani laid out was not just tactical or strategic but philosophical, calling for greater transparency in the US-Pakistan relationship — a transparency overseen by the civilian set-up. On-paper agreements would replace the verbal understandings that have defined the terms of the relationship over the last decade. These would then go through the ministries concerned, including the law ministry, the PCNS, the cabinet and parliament. Slower progress would be an inevitable result, and the security establishment would still play a significant role behind the scenes. But if implemented, and defined in a manner that minimises red tape, this new framework could be a giant leap forward for transparency in the US-Pakistan relationship, the way the Pakistani public perceives the relationship and the strength of civilian institutions.

One particular recommendation does, however, have the potential to become a major roadblock. The PCNS called, more categorically than the parliamentary resolution passed after the Osama bin Laden raid, for an end to drone strikes. But if the terms of these strikes can be renegotiated to ensure that Pakistani sovereignty is not violated, and to minimise non-combatant casualties, it would be worth reconsidering. Drones reach areas the army cannot and cause fewer casualties than traditional air strikes. They have demonstrated their usefulness to Pakistan by taking out Baitullah Mehsud, then Pakistan’s public enemy number one. A more pragmatic approach would be to try to reach an agreement on the frequency of strikes — it would have to be brought down permanently from the pre-Salala level — and on sufficient Pakistani involvement in identifying targets and planning attacks. The risk of adopting the recommendations’ language and calling for an unqualified end to them in a parliamentary resolution is also that they may well continue despite these efforts, embarrassing the civilian set-up and further inflaming public opinion.

Most other demands, while asserting Pakistani sovereignty, have already been stated before or seem more doable. Calls for redrafting agreements on supply routes will come as no surprise here or in Washington. The apology on Salala could well come from the US military, if not from President Obama. Other issues might turn out to be more problematic, including the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline and greater transparency about potential American intelligence activities in Pakistan. In considering these, parliament will have to strike a tricky balance between looking out for Pakistan’s interests and preventing the dissolution of a critical relationship. Sovereignty is important, but Pakistan cannot afford not to be pragmatic.

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Remembering Naveed Anwar

by Zubeida Mustafa

NOT many may recall Naveed Anwar today because when he slipped into the valley of death 14 years ago he went silently without making a splash in the media.

At a time when the Transplant Society of Pakistan is launching its deceased organ donation campaign we should be paying homage to Naveed and the four others who followed his pioneering trail. They conclusively established that our society is capable of unbelievable generosity and care, even in the bad times we live in.

It was in 1998 that Naveed (24), an accountancy student, met with a fatal road accident and was declared brain dead — an irreversible condition when the brainstem stops working. The vital functions (heartbeat and breathing) of a person in this state can be sustained on a respirator for a few days. Naveed’s family — educated and enlightened as they are — came forward to offer his organs for transplantation.

They knew about the procedure as the family had often talked about deceased organ donation. Naveed would, as though presciently, express his wish to gift his organs to save the lives of the seriously ill. Since there was no precedence of such donation in Pakistan, extreme caution was exercised. All the universally recognised protocols were carefully observed and an independent team of neurologists was called in to certify brain death before a separate team of transplantologists retrieved the organs. Most importantly, no financial transaction was involved.

Today Pakistan stands at the brink of the age of deceased organ donation. We have a law on the statute book, namely, the Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Act, 2010. The illegal organ trade that descended on us like a curse faces tough resistance from the advocates of the law. We also have the ‘living’ examples of Naveed and others to show the way.

It is time to break the silence on the issue of the dead donating their organs to the living. There is the closure that this act of magnanimity brings to the grieving family. Naveed’s father termed it as sukoon that he derived from the knowledge that his beloved son had given in his death a new lease of life to others.

The Sindh Institute of Urology and Transplantation (SIUT), regarded as the premier institution in the field in Asia, is at the forefront of the campaign that is being launched to create public awareness and dispel the myths and superstitions about life and death that persist in our society. Strangely, we still have doubting Thomases when many Muslim countries have accepted the concept of brain death and their deceased organ donation programmes have received the ulema’s blessings. Hasn’t the Holy Quran said so categorically, “If anyone saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of all mankind”?

At the launch of the campaign, a team of SIUT doctors — Anwar Naqvi, Naqi Zafar and Nasir Hasan — presented a well-prepared briefing to the media. Nearly 50,000 people come down with organ failure in the country annually and of them 30,000 are in need of kidneys. Only a small fraction of these receive an organ from a live related donor. Organs of people with brain death and on respirators — there are 2,000 of them in Karachi every year — could also be a source of organs if donors can be attracted.

There is need to create public awareness. Towards this aim, a three-day conference will be held in April to be attended by the speaker of the National Assembly. This will be the first step in the journey of a thousand miles towards a fully fledged organ donation and transplantation programme. But many more steps have to be taken. Not only should the donors be registered with an authority — the procedure is still being worked out — it is also important to impress upon prospective donors the importance of sharing their ideas with their families in normal times and not wait for a crisis when sensitive decisions become difficult..There is also the need to organise an organ registry on a national level so that the clinical details of those in need of an organ are stored in its databank for easy access. Of course, surgeons have to be trained in different transplantation fields so that all organs that can be transplanted are used — one deceased donor can benefit 17 people.

Dr Adib Rizvi, director of the SIUT, believes, “Once the need is created the training of manpower will follow automatically.” This is not an empty boast. Dr Rizvi knows best because he is the visionary to whom the SIUT owes its creation.

A great humanist and a friend of the poor, he dreamt of a model health facility in the public sector providing free services to all who, he believes, have the right to healthcare. This dream found expression in the shape of SIUT where even the most expensive state-of-the-art treatment is provided free, with dignity. No one is ever asked to go through a process of proving his poverty to earn an exemption.

The institute is staffed by a team of health professionals that Dr Rizvi has mentored over the years with great devotion. They have been trained in various sub-specialties of urology, transplantation and nephrology. SIUT has expanded over time with the financial cooperation of the community which adores him for his people-friendly style of practising medicine.

www.zubeidamustafa.com

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New Experiment Shows Neutrinos Do Not Travel Faster Than Light

There was definitely some excitement in the physics world last Fall when the OPERA Collaboration in Gran Sasso, Italy, announced that they had measured neutrinos travelling faster than the speed of light. I’ve been skepticalof this announcement since the first day, and in the intervening months since, things have been looking worse for the measurement. This culminated last month when the OPERA Collaboration admitted that the faster-than-light measurement may have been due to a simplemeasurement error.

Now, in what may well be the final nail in the coffin for the claim that neutrinos travel faster than light, scientists from the ICARUS Group, which is also in Gran Sasso, have announced that they’ve measured neutrinos travelling from CERN, and determined that those neutrinos were not travelling faster than light. The ICARUS detector has been involved in the neutrino findings for several months, and last year pointed out the experimental results showed that the CERN neutrinos did not display thedecay pattern expected from neutrinos travelling faster than light.

The ICARUS Detector examined data from neutrinos sent from CERN to Gran Sasso. These neutrinos were from the same pulse that were sent to OPERA, so if the neutrinos were travelling faster than light, the ICARUS detector should have measured that, as well. However, when ICARUS reviewed their data, they found that “The result is compatible with the simultaneous arrival of all the 7 events with the speed of light and not compatible with respect to the result reported by OPERA.”

In order to finally verify whether neturinos from CERN are travelling faster than light, CERN will be working with the Gran Sasso laboratories for a final measurement this May.

“The evidence is beginning to point towards the OPERA result being an artefact of the measurement,” said CERN Research Director Sergio Bertolucci in a press release, “but it’s important to be rigorous, and the Gran Sasso experiments, BOREXINO, ICARUS, LVD and OPERA will be making new measurements with pulsed beams from CERN in May to give us the final verdict.”

There’s another point in the press release from CERN Director Bertolucci that’s worth highlighting as well. ”Whatever the result, the OPERA experiment has behaved with perfect scientific integrity in opening their measurement to broad scrutiny, and inviting independent measurements. This is how science works.”

That’s absolutely right.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2012/03/18/new-experiment-shows-neutrinos-do-not-travel-faster-than-light/ 

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Tendulkar the maestro

BANGLADESH may have rained on India’s parade with a highly unlikely win in the Asia Cup but the occasion was still special for the visiting team. Dhaka witnessed a historic moment in cricketing history on Friday when Indian supremo Sachin Tendulkar, the Little Master, finally notched up his 100th international century encompassing both Tests and One-Day Internationals. There are few records, barring Don Bradman’s astonishing Test average of nearly 100 runs per innings, that Tendulkar does not hold. He was one of the youngest cricketers to make his international debut, against Pakistan at the age of just 16 on Nov 15, 1989 in Karachi. Unlike some other promising players of the 1980s and 1990s, his immense talent did not prove to be short-lived. He complemented his monumental natural gift with hard work and a superb understanding of the game to become the best batsman the subcontinent, if not the world, has ever produced.

Tendulkar, now almost 39, has under his belt the most runs and centuries scored in Tests as well as ODIs. In 2010 he became the first batsman to breach the 200-run barrier in ODIs, a feat equalled by compatriot Virendar Sehwag a year later. Brilliant with the bat and also handy with the ball — though he does not turn his arm over much these days — Tendulkar remains in a class of his own. He is of course idolised in India but cricket fans across the world readily acknowledge that he is a true maestro, a man blessed with not just amazing talent but also a sporting spirit that adds lustre to the game. He has proven that recent calls for his retirement were perhaps premature. Still, Tendulkar is nearing 40 and, unlike some cricketers who continue to play when the inevitable looms large, he may consider bowing out on a historic high.

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Government borrowing

THE hefty increase in the government’s domestic borrowings to finance its budget indicates its deteriorating fiscal position, and underlines many risks to macroeconomic stability and growth prospects. The government’s borrowings of Rs916bn during the first eight months of the current financial year are 55 per cent more than the Rs590bn it had sucked from the banking system to fund its fiscal deficit during the year 2010-11. This is in spite of the 28 per cent increase in tax collection to Rs1.12tr from a year earlier. It points to substantial expenditure slippages mainly on account of energy and other subsidies. This also belies the claim repeatedly made by the managers of the country’s economy to achieve the fiscal deficit target of 4.7 per cent of GDP. Going forward, the government’s need to borrow more from the domestic banking system is projected to grow heavily during the remaining four months of the current fiscal to June, not least because of drying foreign official and private capital inflows and rising energy subsidies. Matters have been made more complicated by the delay in the auction of the 3G telecom licences that is expected to bring in $800m and the reluctance of the US to release the Coalition Support Fund.

The high fiscal deficit and the government’s borrowings to finance it are at the heart of all the economic problems Pakistan faces today. The widening deficit means that inflationary expectations remain high and private investments subdued. The deficit has substantially reduced the government’s ability to fund energy and other infrastructure projects, crucial to boosting economic growth. True, many unfavourable factors like devastating floods, poor security conditions, the global economic recession and rising world oil prices have contributed to the fiscal woes of the government. But it must take responsibility for not addressing structural imbalances like the low tax-to-GDP ratio, energy shortages, rising untargeted energy and other subsidies etc, the major factors behind the deficit over the last four years. Unless these structural issues are dealt with once and for all, the task of controlling deficit and bolstering private investment growth will remain
challenging even beyond this fiscal.

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Presidential address

NEVER before has a Pakistani head of state marked the beginning of a government’s fifth parliamentary year. Like other governments before it, this one has also faced threats to its survival in which both real and implied failures of governance could have been used as excuses to interrupt the course of democracy. But through a combination of savvy politics, an assertion of its own role vis-à-vis other state institutions and changes in the internal calculations of those institutions, it has managed to hang on. In the context of this country’s failed attempts at sustained democracy, that is no mean achievement.

But the fact of having survived is not enough to justify the optimism of Mr Zardari’s assessment of where the country is today. The Pakistan he spoke of yesterday was not the one most Pakistanis would recognise. Playing the role of a head of government — and, in his case, of a party — rather than a head of state, he listed the administration’s actual and fictional accomplishments while paying little attention to shortcomings, painting a picture of a government that has taken giant strides in addressing the energy problem, tackling militancy and improving key economic indicators. Based on the quality of their day-to-day lives, most Pakistanis, it is safe to say, would disagree. It is fair enough to remind the country of achievements in constitutional reform or challenges posed by the last administration’s decisions, the floods and the global recession. But a refusal to move beyond these to sufficiently acknowledge the severity of Pakistan’s continuing challenges, especially on the economic, security and foreign-relations fronts, only further eroded trust in the current leadership’s ability, or desire, to govern effectively. Nor did the president offer any glimpse of a way forward, any hint of what the government might do in its last year to create structural reform or improve the lives of a broader cross-section of Pakistanis rather than, say, the recipients of BISP funds or
fertiliser subsidies.

All of this was entirely predictable, one could argue, given the president’s political allegiances, his previous annual addresses, and the fact that this is his last address before the country goes to the polls. But given the state of the nation, it is still disappointing, more so the fifth time around than the first time around. What the government has done is to bring us to a place where Pakistanis will almost certainly cast their next vote under a civilian dispensation, whether in the next few months
or early next year. The hope now is that the exercise of that right will, over time, produce more candid and accountable administrations.

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How to Become a More Effective Learner

Tips from Psychology to Improve Learning Effectiveness & Efficiency

By Kendra Cherry, About.com Guide

I'm always interested in finding new ways to learn better and faster. As a graduate student who is also a full-time science writer, the amount of time I have to spend learning new things is limited. It's important to get the most educational value out of my time as possible. However, retention, recall and transfer are also critical. I need to be able to accurately remember the information I learn, recall it at a later time and utilize it effectively in a wide variety of situations.

1. Memory Improvement Basics

I've written before about some of the best ways to improve memory. Basic tips such as improving focus, avoiding cram sessions and structuring your study time are a good place to start, but there are even more lessons from psychology that can dramatically improve your learning efficiency.

2. Keep Learning (and Practicing) New Things

Learning and practicing new skills helps your brain retain new information. Image by Mysid.

One sure-fire way to become a more effective learner is to simply keep learning. A 2004 Nature article reported that people who learned how to juggle increased the amount of gray matter in their occipital lobes, the area of the brain is associated with visual memory.¹ When these individuals stopped practicing their new skill, this gray matter vanished.

So if you're learning a new language, it is important to keep practicing the language in order to maintain the gains you have achieved. This "use-it-or-lose-it" phenomenon involves a brain process known as "pruning." Certain pathways in the brain are maintained, while other are eliminated. If you want the new information you just learned to stay put, keep practicing and rehearsing it.

3. Learn in Multiple Ways

Focus on learning in more than one way. Instead of just listening to a podcast, which involves auditory learning, find a way to rehearse the information both verbally and visually. This might involve describing what you learned to a friend, taking notes or drawing a mind map. By learning in more than one way, you’re further cementing the knowledge in your mind. According to Judy Willis, “The more regions of the brain that store data about a subject, the more interconnection there is. This redundancy means students will have more opportunities to pull up all of those related bits of data from their multiple storage areas in response to a single cue. This cross-referencing of data means we have learned, rather than just memorized.”²

4. Teach What You've Learned to Another Person

Teaching can improve your learning. ©René Mansi/iStockPhoto

Educators have long noted that one of the best ways to learn something is to teach it to someone else. Remember your seventh-grade presentation on Costa Rica? By teaching to the rest of the class, your teacher hoped you would gain even more from the assignment. You can apply the same principle today by sharing your newly learned skills and knowledge with others.

Start by translating the information into your own words. This process alone helps solidify new knowledge in your brain. Next, find some way to share what you’ve learned. Some ideas include writing a blog post, creating a podcast or participating in a group discussion.

5. Utilize Previous Learning to Promote New Learning

Another great way to become a more effective learner is to use relational learning, which involves relating new information to things that you already know. For example, if you are learning about Romeo and Juliet, you might associate what you learn about the play with prior knowledge you have about Shakespeare, the historical period in which the author lived and other relevant information.

6. Gain Practical Experience

For many of us, learning typically involves reading textbooks, attending lectures or doing research in the library or on the Web. While seeing information and then writing it down is important, actually putting new knowledge and skills into practice can be one of the best ways to improve learning. If you are trying to acquire a new skill or ability, focus on gaining practical experience. If it is a sport or athletic skill, perform the activity on a regular basis. If you are learning a new language, practice speaking with another person and surround yourself with immersive experiences.

7. Look Up Answers Rather Than Struggle to Remember

Of course, learning isn’t a perfect process. Sometimes, we forget the details of things that we have already learned. If you find yourself struggling to recall some tidbit of information, research suggests that you are better offer simply looking up the correct answer. One studyfound that the longer you spend trying to remember the answer, the more likely you will be to forget the answer again in the future. Why? Because these attempts to recall previously learned information actually results in learning the "error state" instead of the correct response.

8. Understand How You Learn Best

Another great strategy for improving your learning efficiency is to recognize your learning habits and styles. There are a number of different theories about learning styles, which can all help you gain a better understanding of how you learn best. Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences describes eight different types of intelligence that can help reveal your individual strengths. Looking at Carl Jung’s learning style dimensions can also help you better see which learning strategies might work best for you.

9. Use Testing to Boost Learning

Testing can be more beneficial than studying alone. Image by Clinton Cardozo.

While it may seem that spending more time studying is one of the best ways to maximize learning, research has demonstrated that taking tests actually helps you better remember what you've learned, even if it wasn't covered on the test.³ The study revealed that students who studied and were then tested had better long-term recall of the materials, even on information that was not covered by the tests. Students who had extra time to study but were not tested had significantly lower recall of the materials.

10. Stop Multitasking

Multitasking can hurt learning effectiveness. ©Paul Kline/iStockPhoto

For many years, it was thought that people who multitask, or perform more than one activity at once, had an edge over those who did not. However, research now suggests that multitasking can actually make learning less effective. In the study, participants lost significant amounts of time as they switched between multiple tasks and lost even more time as the tasks became increasingly complex.⁴ By switching from one activity to another, you will learn more slowly, become less efficient and make more errors. How can you avoid the dangers of multitasking? Start by focusing your attention on the task at hand and continue working for a predetermined amount of time.

11. References

¹ Draganski, B., Gaser, C., Busch, V., & Schuierer, G. (2004). Neuroplasticity: Changes in grey matter induced by training. Nature, 427(22), 311-312.

² Willis, J. (2008). Brain-based teaching strategies for improving students' memory, learning, and test-taking success.(Review of Research). Childhood Education, 83(5), 31-316.

³ Chan, J.C., McDermott, K.B., & Roediger, H.L. (2007). Retrieval-induced facilitation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 135(4), 553-571.

⁴ Rubinstein, Joshua S.; Meyer, David E.; Evans, Jeffrey E. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 27(4), 763-797.

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