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Category: Lifestyle

  • Fashion brand Boohoo’s ‘Made in UK’ clothes actually manufactured in South Asia

    Fashion brand Boohoo’s ‘Made in UK’ clothes actually manufactured in South Asia

    UK fashion brand Boohoo has been accused of labelling clothes made in Pakistan and other Asian countries as ‘Made in UK’.


    In a report by BBC, it has been revealed that the retailer brand Boohoo has been found to have mislabelled items of clothing made in South Asia as indigenously manufactured.

    In a Panorama investigation, it was shown that plain T-shirts and hoodies had their original labels removed at Boohoo’s flagship factory in Thurmaston Lane in Leicester, last year.


    Thurmaston Lane opened two years ago and was promoted by the retailer as a UK manufacturing centre of excellence, offering end-to-end garment production in the UK.


    The mislabelling took place at the factory, affecting up to one in 250 of Boohoo’s global supply of garments between January and October 2023.
    The BBC estimates that this could amount to hundreds of thousands of wrongly labelled garments. However, the retailer would not provide precise figures.
    Boohoo claims it was an isolated incident which had happened as “a result of human error”.


    A company spokesperson said, “We have taken steps to ensure this does not happen again.”


    The garments had been shipped from Pakistan and other countries in South Asia to Boohoo’s Leicester factory where they were printed on.

    Boohoo is considering closing its Leicester factory and relocating operations. However, the clothing retailer said plans to shut the site are not related to the findings of the Panorama investigation, adding that due to “significant investments” at its US distribution centres, it must take steps to ensure the brand is a “more efficient, productive and strengthened business”. It also suggested that the incorrect labels were down to a misinterpretation of the labelling rules.

  • Two brothers killed in Karachi after telling motorcycle riders to not speed

    Two brothers killed in Karachi after telling motorcycle riders to not speed

    Two brothers were killed in a firing incident during a dispute over underage motorcycle drivers driving fast in Karachi’s Baldia Etihad Town area, reports Geo.


    The victims have been identified as Hussain Amin and Farooq Amin, both of whom were shot dead near Khan Muhammad Chowk. The victims were the owners of a Papar factory.

    The police found out in the initial investigation that the shooting happened as a result of a clash between two groups. The dispute took place over banning children from driving fast on their motorcycles.

    According to an eyewitness account, the children who were stopped by the two brothers were called the adults of their families. After some time, gunfire broke out.


    Farooq was the father of five children while Hussain had two daughters.


    The police further said that the suspects involved in the incident have been identified and raids are being conducted to arrest them.

  • Israeli War Minister tells Netanyahu to ‘stop lying’

    Israeli War Minister tells Netanyahu to ‘stop lying’

    A member of the Israeli war cabinet, Gadi Eisenkot, has told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a meeting to “stop lying” to himself.

    The Times of Israel has reported that while addressing the cabinet, Eisenkot stated, “We have to stop lying to ourselves, to show courage, and to lead to a large deal which will bring home the hostages. Your time is running out, and each day that passes endangers their lives.”


    The minister’s son and nephew were both killed fighting in Gaza, leading him to believe that Israel’s leaders are lying to themselves.

    Gadi Eisenkot with his deceased son.

    However, Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant dismissed the criticism, reiterating their belief that only added military pressure will lead to such a deal.

  • Hamas says many hostages likely killed, blames Israel

    Hamas says many hostages likely killed, blames Israel

    Many of the hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip are likely to have been killed, a spokesman for the group said Sunday, blaming the Israeli leadership for their fate.

    “The fate of many of the enemy’s hostages and detainees has become unknown in recent weeks and the rest have all entered the tunnel of the unknown due to the Zionist aggression,” Abu Obeida said in a televised statement.

    “Most likely, many of them were killed recently, the rest are in great danger every hour and the enemy’s leadership and army bear full responsibility.”
    Abu Obeida said the group’s allies from the “axis of resistance” had informed Hamas they would “expand their attacks” against Israeli troops in the coming days.

    “After 100 days of battle… this is the enemy’s leadership, gulping down pain and wading through the mud of failure and setback,” he said.

  • Former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Arden marries long-time beau at 43

    Former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Arden marries long-time beau at 43

    Former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Arden has married long-time beau Clark Gayford in an intimate ceremony on January 13. The two have been together for a decade now and got engaged five years ago. Their wedding plans got cancelled after the COVID-19 pandemic.


    Ardern, 43, and Gayford, 47, had scheduled their wedding for early 2022 after getting engaged in May 2019 but had to postpone it due to the pandemic, Reuters has said.


    In a post shared on Instagram, Jacinda shared a picture from the wedding with the caption, “Worth the wait”.


    The couple’s five-year-old daughter Neve walked down the aisle with her father, wearing a dress made of fabric from her grandmother Laurell Ardern’s wedding dress, the New Zealand Herald reported.


    According to the news site Stuff, the pair’s special day was attended by some 50 to 75 guests, including opposition leader Chris Hipkins, Ardern’s successor as prime minister, the New Zealand Herald said.


    Ardern became a global icon for women in leadership and her left-leaning politics. The key events during her tenure were the attack on Christchurch Mosque and the pandemic of Covid-19.

    She was inspired by Pakistan’s Benazir Bhutto. While being Prime Minister, she paid tribute to the late Benazir Bhutto, a former Pakistani prime minister, during her Harvard University Commencement address. Bhutto was the first to give birth in office and Ardern was the second, her daughter was born on Bhutto’s birthday. “The path she carved as a woman feels as relevant today as it was decades ago, and so too is the message she shared here, in this place,” Ardern said about Bhutto’s own 1989 commencement address at Harvard entitled “Democratic nations must unite.”

    Arden gave her final speech in January last year, where she told Gayford, a New Zealand television presenter, “Let’s finally get married.”

  • ‘We love life’: Gaza couple celebrate wartime wedding

    ‘We love life’: Gaza couple celebrate wartime wedding

    Surrounded by family and friends, clapping and cheering, Gaza woman Afnan Jibril beams a brilliant smile on her wedding day, determined to celebrate even as war rages.

    “We are a people that love life, despite death, murders and destruction,” said her father, Mohamed Jibril.

    Relatives were gathered on Friday for the wartime wedding in a tiny room at an abandoned school building in the besieged Gaza Strip’s southern city of Rafah, near the frontier with Egypt.

    The city has suffered daily Israeli bombardment, and the families of both bride and groom are among hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who have fled the fighting further north.

    “The usual preparations for marriage are not possible, and traditional ceremonies are not feasible,” said the bride’s father. “However, clothes are available, although they are scarce and expensive.”

    Afnan, 17, donning a crown of flowers and pristine white dress with stark red embroidery, and her partner Mustafa Shamlakh, 26, want to make the most of their rare chance to celebrate.

    They dance and laugh as guests spray white mousse around the room.

    But eventually they have to face reality.

    Israel’s relentless military campaign, triggered by attacks by Palestinian militants, has killed at least 23,843 people, mostly women and children, in Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.

    The war began when Hamas militants launched an unprecedented attack on October 7, which resulted in about 1,140 deaths in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

    The newlyweds make up part of another grim tally — those displaced by the violence, which UN estimates put at 1.9 million Palestinians out of a total population in Gaza of 2.4 million.

    “The house where the groom was supposed to live was destroyed,” Ayman Shamlakh, the groom’s uncle, told AFP.

    As the war went on, both families felt there was nothing to be gained from waiting and they agreed to the marriage.

    After the school celebration, the couple head for a ceremony set to take place in a tent.

    As they dive into a waiting black SUV, surrounded by a massive crowd of well-wishers, it almost looks like any other wedding day.

    “We are all living through the same tragedy,” said Ayman Shamlakh. “However, we must continue to live, and life should go on.”

  • Afghan child killed in Karachi in fight over garbage collection

    Afghan child killed in Karachi in fight over garbage collection

    A 5-year-old child, Shehzad Gul, was beaten to death in what is being described as a dispute over garbage collection between two groups in Surjani Town, Karachi, reports Dawn.


    The horrific incident took place in Sector-4B. Shehzad Gul was one of three children and had two sisters.


    The dispute erupted between two Afghans over the collection of garbage, which led to the murder. The suspect(s) had been identified and police were waiting for the family to lodge an FIR to formally initiate legal proceedings.

    The victim’s father, Gul Mohammad, told reporters that he had been collecting garbage from houses for the last one month. On Friday, his son and a daughter accompanied him to collect the garbage.


    During the work, he left both children for a while and went to another street and when he returned, he learned that his son had been injured after being hit with a hard and blunt instrument.
    He rushed the child to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital (ASH) where doctors confirmed his death.
    The grief-stricken father said that he had been receiving “threats” from a man who had got the contract of garbage collection earlier. He suspected that his son was killed over that dispute.
    “I am a poor labourer who earns Rs13,000 on a monthly basis through garbage collection,” said the father.

  • Cashier arrested after allegedly stealing more than three crore in banking fraud

    Cashier arrested after allegedly stealing more than three crore in banking fraud

    Ghulam Muhammad, alleged to be involved in stealing more than three crores in banking fraud, has been arrested from Karachi.

    The Commercial Banking Circle of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) conducted a raid to arrest Ghulam Muhammad.

    According to Director FIA Karachi Zone Zaeem Iqbal, the suspect was posted as a cashier in the branch of a private bank located in Sadar area of Karachi.
    He has been accused of embezzling a total of three crore, 29 lakh and 78 thousand rupees by issuing, without permission, fake cash transits to various branches under the guise of excess cash.

    According to the initial investigation, no request for cash was received from the above branches, while the suspect did not hand over the said amount to the van used for cash transit after making cash entries last year in May, June and July.

    As per FIA, the suspect had fled after cheating. After his arrest, raids are being conducted to apprehend others from the group.

  • Flood-affected areas unlikely to produce good voter turnout in Balochistan and Sindh: Report

    Flood-affected areas unlikely to produce good voter turnout in Balochistan and Sindh: Report

    The Centre for Peace and Development Initiatives (CPDI) has stated in a report that over 10 million individuals faced displacement while 2.1 million homes were damaged in Sindh and approximately 100,000 in Balochistan in the devastating floods that hit Pakistan in 2022. The findings of the report reveal that due to financial constraints, there is a possibility that low-income migrated families will not return to cast their votes in the upcoming general elections.


    The lack of Computerised National Identity Cards (CNICs) and damaged pathways to polling stations jeopardise participation of the flood-affected communities, reports Dawn.


    A study by CPDI, conducted in Sindh and Balochistan, identifies multiple problems faced by flood-affected communities which may adversely affect voter turnout. It shows key issues, notably the absence of CNICs and damaged pathways to potential polling stations or school buildings.


    While highlighting the issues, CPDI urged authorities to take immediate measures to facilitate voter turnout in the flood-affected areas specifically in Khairpur, Naushahro Feroz, Naseerabad and Jaffarabad.


    The qualitative assessment was undertaken in the severely affected provinces of Sindh and Balochistan, highlighting various critical issues, including the absence and delays in obtaining national identity cards, damaged infrastructure such as roads and designated polling stations/school buildings, waning interest in political leaders due to insufficient post-disaster rehabilitation efforts, and concerns about the displaced community’s return to exercise their voting rights.


    Additionally, individuals with lifelong injuries may be bedridden, posing a challenge for their participation in the general election (GE) 2024. These findings underscore the multifaceted challenges affecting the electoral landscape in flood-affected regions.


    A significant number of flood victims lost their CNICs (at least one in every household), delays in renewal of CNICs are primarily because of the crowded and limited number of Nadra centres established at village level, residents added that mobile registration vans of Nadra initially helped but were later discontinued.


    “Furthermore, daily wage earners also find it financially burdensome to visit Nadra centres. CPDI urges the authorities to take immediate action to ensure that eligible voters in flood-affected regions receive their CNICs before elections. Moreover, damaged roads and access tracks force voters to take longer alternative routes to reach polling stations, reported in all villages of selected districts in Sindh and Balochistan.


    “Increased distances, combined with high transportation costs, will likely discourage voters, particularly women, elderly, differently-abled and low-income individuals, from travelling to cast their votes. With over 40 per cent of school buildings damaged and incomplete recovery efforts, newly designated polling stations may be distant, posing accessibility challenges for flood-affected residents on polling day without adequate transportation,” the report stated.

  • Woman of Pakistani origin elected as mayor of New Jersey

    Woman of Pakistani origin elected as mayor of New Jersey


    Fauzia Janjua has become the first Muslim and Pakistani-American to take oath for the office of the mayor of New Jersey. She took an oath of her new responsibility on the Holy Quran alongside her husband and children at Township Hall.


    Fauzia’s father Idris belongs to Chakwal while her mother is from Lahore. Her father migrated to the US, where she was born, in the 1970s. She opted for community service and is imparting education to poor children and prisoners. With her election, the position of mayor has gone to Democrats for the first time in 36 years. Before her election, the mayor slot was always held by a Republican representative.


    In the speech she gave on the historic occasion, Fauzia Janjua described her election as the first Muslim lady of Pakistan origin as a moment of pride, reports The News.


    New Jersey State Representative, Carol Murphy, wrote on X: “It is such a great honour to administer the oaths of office tonight in Mount Laurel. It was extremely special to celebrate my dear friends — Mayor Fozia Janjua (1st Muslim & South Asian Mayor in township history) & Deputy Mayor Nik Moustakas on this historic occasion.”


    Her election came about just days after when the Imam of a local mosque was shot dead.