Hamza Shehbaz Sharif was elected Chief Minister (CM) Punjab yesterday (Friday) after Punjab Assembly Deputy Speaker Dost Mazari rejected 10 Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) votes.
Deputy Speaker Mazari said no PML-Q votes will be counted because of party head Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain’s letter.
The crucial session faced a three-hour long delay with a day-long political drama. Amid the political chaos, Pakistani Twitter users could not stop making memes.
Have a look at the tweets:
The Minor, who was sent to a Dar-ul–Aman (shelter home) in Lahore on court orders, was allowed to meet a stranger by a local magistrate.
“Extremely questionable proceedings of the Concerned Magistrate at Lahore who on the application of a complete Stranger has allowed her to meet The Minor at Darul Aman to get Vakalatnamas signed whereas kept our application to intimate Court abt Hon SHC order is pending,” tweeted lawyer Jibran Nasir, who is representing The Minor’s father.
The Sindh High Court (SHC) on Thursday ordered to transfer The Minor to Karachi. A two-member SHC bench announced its verdict yesterday on a petition filed by The Minor’s father Syed Mehdi Ali Kazmi regarding the alleged kidnapping and child marriage of his daughter.
Samina Baig, a mountaineer from Gilgit-Shimshal Baltistan, has become the first Pakistani woman to reach the top of K2. At 7:42 am today (Friday), Samina Baig and a Pakistani team of seven successfully ascended the treacherous peak of K2.
The team consists of mountaineers Samina Baig, Eid Muhammad, Bulbul Kari, Ahmed Baig, Rizwan Dad, Waqar Ali, and Akber Hussain Sadpara.
Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif congratulated Samina Baig on her achievement.
“Samina Baig has emerged as a symbol of determination, courage and bravery of Pakistani women,” tweeted PM Shehbaz.
The second-highest summit in the world, K2, is 8,611 metres above sea level. It is considered to be the most hazardous and challenging summit in the world.
In 2013, Baig became the first Pakistani woman to summit Mt Everest, the tallest mountain in the world.
Indian journalist and fact-checker Mohammed Zubair was released from jail on Wednesday (July 20). He was granted bail by the Indian Supreme Court.
The police also charged him with criminal conspiracy, destroying evidence and receiving foreign funds in at least half a dozen other cases.
Mohammed Zubair is a co-founder of fact-checking website Alt News. He is a critic of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government, and regularly tracks and highlights anti-Muslim hate speech by Hindu right-wing activists and politicians.
He was detained because of a tweet from 2018 that included a screenshot from a well-known Hindi film, which authorities claim was insulting to Hindu religious beliefs.
Just a few days prior to his detention, he had called attention to Nupur Sharma, a suspended BJP spokeswoman, who had made offensive remarks about the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) during a TV debate.
Journalists allege that BJP-linked trolls weaponised Twitter and the law to send Zubair to jail in a fake case.
The United States (US) removed Pakistan from its human trafficking watchlist.
Although Pakistan was taken off the “watchlist,” Pakistan remains on Tier 2, which serves as a warning that penalties might be imposed if it didn’t make any further progress and will be downgraded to Tier 3, which would lead to sanctions.
Tier 2 nations are those who are making considerable efforts in that direction. Pakistan’s performance in combating trafficking, according to the study, has improved.
“The government demonstrated overall increasing efforts compared with the previous reporting period, considering the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, if any, on its anti-trafficking capacity; therefore Pakistan was upgraded to Tier 2,” the report said.
“The government allocated resources for the implementation of the National Action Plan (NAP) and amended the Prevention of Trafficking in Persons Act (PTPA) to remove provisions that allowed fines in lieu of imprisonment for sex trafficking crimes with women and children as victims,” the report added.
Almost 100 female students were asked to remove their undergarments before taking a medical entrance exam in India. The incident took place at an exam centre in Kollam city. Their parents have filed a complaint.
Their undergarments were found piled up by students after the exams. The students claimed that they had to go through severe psychological trauma before the exam.
The father of a 17-year-old girl who was taking her first-ever medical exam claims that his daughter is still recovering from the painful experience of having to take the three-hour exam while not wearing a brassiere.
The Kerala Police on Tuesday, 19 July, arrested five women who were on duty when girl students appearing for the entrance test were asked to remove their undergarments.
The institute, where the incident took place, has denied involvement, claiming that the frisking and biometric checks were performed by third-party agencies
Sania Khan, a South-Asian woman from Chicago who used to document events reflecting her abusive marriage and talked about her experience of divorce, was murdered by her ex-husband.
Her ex-husband, Raheel Ahmed, killed her and then committed suicide by shooting himself.
The family of the man had reported him missing from the Atlanta suburb.
According to two of Sania’s friends, the divorce was finalised in May. The police found a suicide note near Ahmed’s body.
Who was Sania Khan?
Sania Khan was a wedding photographer by profession. She also used to post her work on TikTok videos. “Ever since I can remember, photography has been a huge part of my identity. My life truly began the day I purchased my first DSLR. I wouldn’t know it at the time but it would forever change me,” she wrote on her website.
However, her most recent uploads from June mainly concentrated on the situation with her divorce. She posted videos that talked about an abusive relationship with her ex-husband.
The text of one of the videos Sania posted read, “Going through a divorce as a South Asian woman feels like you have failed at life sometimes.”
People on Twitter are reacting to the news of Sania’s murder:
Google has announced the launch of its “Android Earthquake Alerts System” in Pakistan, which will send automatic early warning alerts that help people be prepared for an emergency.
“Android Earthquake Alerts System is a no-cost, helpful android feature that detects earthquakes around the world and alerts people. It uses sensors in Android smartphones,” said Google in a statement.
“When people look up ‘earthquake’ or ‘earthquake near me’, they will find relevant results, along with helpful resources on what to do after an earthquake,” the statement further added.
“Pakistan has experienced several earthquakes in the past, especially in the northern and western parts of the country. With the expansion of this earthquake alerts system, android users in Pakistan may receive automatic early warning alerts that help them be prepared for an emergency.”
“One feature titled ‘Be Aware’ alerts people when earthquakes with a magnitude of 4.5 occur, or an intensity level of 3 or 4 on the MMI scale. The notification is sent along with the distance of the earthquake’s epicentre. The alert uses the phone’s current volume, vibration, and Do Not Disturb settings.”
The Android Earthquake Alerts System was initially launched in New Zealand and Greece.
A leading immunologist has warned that a new Covid variant can cause a different symptom that only occurs at night.
BA.5 was first discovered in South Africa earlier this year. It is a highly-contagious subvariant that can cause night sweats. The variant is contributing to a fresh wave of infections across the world.
Professor Luke O’Neill from Trinity College Dublin called this symptom “strange”.
“One extra symptom from BA.5 I saw this morning is night sweats.”
“The disease is slightly different because the virus has changed. But if you are vaccinated and you’re boosted, it doesn’t progress into the severe disease,” Professor O’Neill added.
BA.5’s ability to reinfect is concerning to healthcare professionals. It is pertinent to mention that previously, if a person had been infected with SARS-CoV-2, they were considered safe from the virus after one cycle ended. With the subvariants, this is not the case anymore.
A Ukrainian soldier was saved by his iPhone 11 Pro and his video has gone viral on social media.
The clip shows a Ukrainian soldier taking an iPhone out of his bag. The iPhone acted as a bulletproof vest for the man as the bullet would otherwise have killed him.
What’s interesting here is to see that the battery of the phone didn’t explode and acted as a shield for the soldier.
The phone was completely destroyed because of the bullet.