Karachi | Pakistan

The Sindh government on Friday ordered a private school in Karachi to reverse fee hikes imposed during the summer holidays. In a letter addressed to the principal and administrator of Veritas Learning Circle (Primary), dated July 10 (Friday), Sindh’s Directorate of Inspection and Registration of Private Institutions — part of the provincial government’s School Education and Literacy Department — referred to a hearing held the previous day regarding complaints about the school’s “illegal and extraordinary” fee hike. A copy of the letter is available with Dawn. “During the course of the hearing, it was determined that your school, including all of its campuses, had enhanced tuition fees without the approval of the registration authority, in violation of the Rule 7(6) of the Sindh Private Educational Institutions (Regulation and Control) Rules 2005,” the letter said. The rule states that “any complaint regarding the tuition fees in violation of the rules or charging of any fee other than tuition fees shall be li...

ISLAMABAD / KARACHI: The Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) on Thursday recalled expansive Supreme Court orders from 2018 and 2019, which had authorised the Sindh government to demolish a number of illegally constructed buildings in Karachi, including the infamous 15-storey Nasla Tower on Sharae Faisal. In a judgement billed as redefining the boundaries of exercising judicial authority, the FCC ruled that though the objective behind the SC directions to demolish illegal buildings were well-intentioned and aimed at improvement of the city, the enforcement of building laws remained primarily within the domain of the provincial government, not the judiciary. Justice Aamer Farooq, who authored the judgement, was heading a two-judge FCC bench that had taken up a set of appeals initially moved before the Supreme Court, but later transferred to FCC after the passage of the 27th Constitutional Amendment. The ruling emphasised that it was for the government and its agencies to take all necessary legal measures to ensu...

KARACHI: A judicial magistrate on Thursday handed over a 20-year-old man accused of sexually assaulting and murdering a six-year-old boy to police on a five-day physical remand. The child’s body had been found in an empty plot near Karachi’s Lea Market on the night of July 7, a day after he went missing. Police said that although doctors had collected samples to ascertain sexual assault, the arrested suspect had confessed during the initial probe to kidnapping the boy for that purpose. Napier police presented the suspect at City Courts on Thursday under tight security, with his face covered. The investigation officer (IO) requested a 14-day physical remand, seeking time to interrogate the suspect to arrest his accomplices. The IO also informed the court that a provision related to rape had been added to the case. Subsequently, the court sent the suspect on a five-day physical remand and directed the IO to produce him at the next hearing along with a progress report. On the complaint of the boy’s father, the N...

Karachi residents received respite from the recent heat as sea breeze and increased cloud cover lowered temperatures, with the Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) forecasting light drizzle and partly cloudy skies over the next three days.

KARACHI: A sessions court on Thursday sentenced a man to death on two counts in a case pertaining to the 2019 murder of TV anchor Mureed Abbas and his friend over a monetary dispute. Prime suspect Atif Zaman and his brother, Adil Zaman, were arrested and booked by the police for killing Abbas and Khizer Hayat, who were their business partners, in Karachi’s Khayaban-i-Bukhari area on the night of July 9, 2019, seven years ago. Daniyal Muhammad Hussain — a part of the legal team that represented the complainant, Abbas’s wife, alongside Advocate Jibran Nasir — said that Adil Zaman had been declared an absconder in the case after escaping following the cancellation of his bail by the Supreme Court’s Karachi registry. He remains an absconder. Abbas was a Bol News anchorperson. In the incident — which at the time was said to be a “personal dispute” — he was gunned down while Hayat also received multiple bullet wounds. Hayat was shifted to a private hospital but he succumbed to his wounds, according to the police. I...

KARACHI: A missing six-year old boy was found raped and murdered near Karachi’s Lea Market on Wednesday, with the police claiming to have arrested a 20-year old suspect who happened to be a neighbour of the victim. Napier police said that the body of the boy was found at Punjab Gali near Spencer’s Eye Hospital, and moved to Karachi’s Civil Hospital for legal formalities. Police surgeon Dr Summaiya Syed said that the body was “decomposed” and there were “multiple bone injuries”. “All samples have been collected for sexual violence and chemical analysis,” she said, adding that the cause of death was “reserved”. Deputy Inspector General (DIG) South Syed Asad Raza told Dawn that although doctors had collected samples to ascertain sexual assault, the arrested suspect had confessed during the initial probe to kidnapping the boy for that purpose. After allegedly killing the boy, the suspect kept the body on the rooftop of his house. It was later thrown from the third floor into an empty plot on Tuesday night, wrappe...

The US consulates in Lahore and Karachi are set to resume regular consular services from July 20, 2026, the US Embassy in Islamabad said in a statement on Wednesday. The consulates will provide services to US citizens as well as process non-immigrant visa applications. US consular services in Lahore and Karachi were suspended in March after protests turned deadly at the onset of the US-Israel war with Iran. On March 1, 10 people were killed in Karachi when protesters clashed with law enforcement personnel near the US Consulate on Mai Kolachi Road. Law enforcement personnel resorted to teargas shelling and baton-charge to control the situation, and US Marines were reported to have opened fire on the protestors. Protest against the attacks on Iran also took place in Islamabad, where at least two protesters died and over 30 were injured during clashes with law enforcement personnel near the Diplomatic Enclave. Following the protests, on March 4, the US State Department ordered non-emergency personnel from US con...

KARACHI: A power breakdown by K-Electric at the Dhabeji Pumping Station on Tuesday disrupted operations of the Karachi Water and Sewerage Corporation (KWSC) and is expected to reduce the city’s water supply by nearly 100 million gallons per day (MGD). According to a KWSC spokesperson, the electricity outage affected the K-2 Pump House, where the manifold chamber and main valves developed a fault. “Work is being carried out at full pace to remove accumulated water from the affected valves, after which repair work will begin immediately,” he said. He added that the water utility had directed technical teams to undertake emergency repairs. “Engineers and maintenance staff are present at the site to identify and fix the fault as quickly as possible”, the official said. The spokesperson said that as a result of the malfunction, three major pumps at the K-2 Pumping Station had been temporarily shut down. “The disruption is expected to reduce Karachi’s daily water supply by around 100 million gallons,” he added. It ...

KARACHI has been ranked among the ‘least-liveable cities in the world’, ranking 170th among 173 cities on the Economist Intelligence Unit’s annual Global Liveability Index 2026. The only cities ranked below Karachi include Dhaka, Tripoli and Damascus, while war-torn Tehran (164) and Kyiv (166) scored slightly higher. According to EIU, issues such as congested roads and crime tend to punish the index’s biggest cities. The EIU’s ranking, which evaluates living conditions across 173 cities, provides a globally recognised benchmark for urban liveability and resilience. It measures measuring indicators such as stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education and infrastructure, and quantifies the challenges presented to an individual’s lifestyle in any given location. Getting an overall score (out of 100) of 43 — the same as Algiers — Karachi’s scored poorly in nearly all metrics, except education. It scored 20 on stability, 54 on healthcare, 36 in culture and environment, 75 in education and 52 in infras...

RAWALPINDI: A K2 Airways Boeing 737-400 cargo aircraft en route from Sharjah to Karachi disappeared from radar over the Arabian Sea, about 300 kilometres west of Karachi, on Tuesday. According to reports, the aircraft lost contact about 300 kilometres west of Karachi while approaching Pakistani airspace. The pilot reported a navigation problem during the flight and requested assistance from the area control centre. K2 Airways is a private airline based in Karachi. The carrier was established in May 2018 after being granted an airline charter licence by the government. There were five crew members on board the aircraft, the Pakistan Airports Authority (PAA) said. The authority added that a K2 Airways Boeing 737 Pakistan Cargo flight en route from Sharjah to Karachi reported a navigational system issue at 9:18pm and was promptly guided by the Karachi Area Control Centre (ACC). However, at 9:21pm, the aircraft was observed on radar “rapidly descending” and making a sharp change in heading. Subsequently, “radar c...

The Sindh Counter-terrorism Department (CTD) on Monday said it had thwarted a major terrorist plot in Karachi by arresting two members of the proscribed group, the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA). In a statement, it said that “in view of the recent wave of terrorism in the country, especially Karachi, the CTD and federal intelligence agencies conducted an intelligence-based operation (IBO) on July 6 and arrested two trained BLA terrorists”. It added that “bomb-making material” was recovered from the two, who had planned to “target sensitive installations and the offices of law enforcement agencies”. It identified the terrorists as Mujahid Baloch and Farid Baloch. The CTD said the two terrorists were trained in a BLA camp in “recce and communication”. “They were living in Karachi under the direction of their commanders, Sajid Baloch and Bashir Zaib,” it said. It said teams recovered four kilogrammes of explosive material, a detonator, a prama card, and a ball ring from them. The department said cases had been reg...

• Buses, private transporters, ride-hailing apps still charging rates set during Iran-US war • Commuters urge Sindh govt to take action and bring transport fares to pre-conflict level KARACHI: Despite a cumulative reduction of around Rs100 per litre in petrol and diesel prices in recent weeks, commuters in Karachi say private transport operators and ride-hailing services have yet to lower fares, prompting calls for government intervention to ensure that the benefit of lower fuel prices is passed on to passengers. Speaking with Dawn, many passengers claim that transporters increased intra-city fares by around 40 per cent after the government sharply raised petroleum prices amid heightened regional tensions. At that time, the transport operators argued that it had become financially “impossible” to continue operating at the pre-conflict fare structure. However, the commuters add, the situation has since changed considerably. Successive cuts in fuel prices have brought the rates of both petrol and diesel down by...

The lion at the animal sanctuary after rescue.—Dawn KARACHI: A lion whose distress image went viral on social media after being discovered in a private zoo in Nazimabad has been rescued and safely moved to an animal sanctuary, it emerged on Saturday. “The lion was in bad shape so we had to get him out of the private zoo first in an emergency. There are still other animals that are in line to also be moved out of the place,” animal activist Jude Allen told Dawn. He said that the lion was lucky to have a chain of events take place in his favour, the most important of which was the arrival of Sana Raja, a highly experienced wildlife rescuer and behaviourist with extensive fieldwork and training including exposure to advanced conservation practices in South Africa, in Karachi. Allen got to know her during her previous mission of the rescue and rehabilitation of Rano, a Himalayan bear. “This time she was back in the city after successfully rescuing another two bears from abusive captivity in Islamabad who, on the ...

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) sought on Thursday a detailed report from the provincial health secretary and police chief after a citizen filed a petition, citing reports of an HIV outbreak allegedly resulting from the reuse of contaminated syringes and medical negligence at a Karachi hospital. The petition, filed by Tariq Mansoor, was taken up by a two-member SHC bench comprising Justice Adnanul Karim Memon and Justice Adnan Iqbal Chaudhry. In its written order, seen by Dawn, the bench noted that the plea arose from “the reported HIV outbreak at Kulsum Bai Valika SESSI Hospital, SITE, Karachi, allegedly caused by the reuse of contaminated syringes and gross medical negligence, resulting in the infection of approximately 84 to over 200 children, with several reported fatalities”. The order noted that the medical facility was a “public hospital functioning under the Sindh Employees Social Security Institution (SESSI) and was “responsible for providing medical facilities to insured workers and their depend...

One of the attackers involved in the incident at the Pakistan Rangers (Sindh) Camp in Karachi’s Gulistan-i-Jauhar has detailed how the attack was carried out and revealed that he was trained in Afghanistan, according to security sources. The attack was carried out on Saturday night, following which three security personnel were martyred during an exchange of fire with the terrorists, Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said on Sunday. ISPR said in a statement that the attack was carried out by terrorists “belonging to Indian proxy, Jamaatul Ahrar (JuA)”, adding that three terrorists were killed in retaliatory action while one was arrested. Later, security sources said the arrested terrorist had identified himself as Usman Ali and revealed that he had come to Pakistan from Jalalabad in Afghanistan. They added that Ali identified the three other attackers as Abdul Hadi, Janaan and Umar Farooq. Moreover, the sources said, he admitted that he belonged to JuA, whose commander in Afghanistan he identified as Ahr...

One of the attackers of the Pakistan Rangers (Sindh) Camp in Karachi’s Gulistan-i-Jauhar has detailed how the attack was carried out and revealed that he was trained in Afghanistan, according to security sources. The attack was carried out on Saturday night, following which three security personnel were martyred during an exchange of fire with the terrorists, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said on Sunday. The ISPR said in a statement that the attack was carried out by terrorists “belonging to Indian proxy, Jamaatul Ahrar (JuA)”, adding that three terrorists were killed in retaliatory action while one was arrested. Later, security sources said the arrested terrorist had identified himself as Usman Ali and revealed that he had come to Pakistan from Jalalabad in Afghanistan. They added that Ali identified the three other attackers as Abdul Hadi, Janaan and Umar Farooq. Moreover, the sources said, he admitted that he belonged to Jamaatul Ahrar, whose commander in Afghanistan he identified as Ahrar Mou...

Three security personnel were martyred during an exchange of fire after a terrorist attack last night on a Rangers facility in Karachi was “decisively foiled”, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said on Sunday. The attack on the Pakistan Rangers (Sindh) Camp, located in Gulistan-i-Jauhar, was carried out by terrorists “belonging to Indian proxy, Jamaatul Ahrar”, the ISPR said in a statement. The military’s media affairs wing added: “The assailants, after a blast at [the] main gate of the Camp, attempted to breach the perimeter security. “However, their nefarious designs were decisively foiled by the vigilant and resolute response of Rangers troops, eliminating three kharijis and capturing one khariji, who is an Afghan national, in injured condition.” The Pakistani government uses the term khariji (outcast) when referring to the perpetrators of terrorist attacks on Pakistan. The ISPR said that during the fire exchange, “three brave sons of soil, rendered the ultimate sacrifice and embraced martyrdom in...

Karachi Traffic Police (KTP) on Tuesday provided alternative routes for commuters to use as some roads will remain closed for the 8th, 9th and 10th Muharram processions. In a statement issued on X, the KTP said on Tuesday, “Special arrangements have been made to ensure the traffic flow and facilitate the citizens during the 8th, 9th, and 10th Muharram processions.” According to a press release issued by the Karachi deputy inspector general’s (DIG) office, attached to the post, “On 8/9/10 Muharram (June 24/25/26, 2026), the central procession will depart from Nishtar Park and conclude at Imambargah Hussainia Iranian via its traditional routes. “Due to security reasons, M.A. Jinnah Road will be closed to traffic from Gurumandir to Tower,” it added. The press release also shared the alternative routes for the commuters to reach their destinations. District Central: Commuters coming from Nazimabad can reach their destination from Lasbela Chowk via Nishtar Road heading to Garden. Commuters coming from Liaquatabad ...

The Karachi Gateway Terminal Ltd (KGTL) is planning up to $100 million in new investment within five years as Pakistan tries to cut freight costs and turn a cargo surge triggered by the Iran war into longer-term regional shipping gains. KGTL, backed by Abu Dhabi Ports Group, has already completed a $60m dredging project at Karachi Port and is expanding container and bulk-handling facilities, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Khurram Aziz Khan told Reuters in an interview. “We are targeting another $75 million to $100 million” within five years, Khan said, adding that the next phase would focus on expanding the container terminal, enhancing yard capacity, larger ship and yard cranes, dedicated bulk export infrastructure, silos, warehouses and automated conveying. Khurram Aziz Khan, CEO of Karachi Gateway Terminal Limited (KGTL) and Karachi Gateway Terminal Multipurpose Limited (KGTML), speaks during a Reuters interview in Karachi on June 23, 2026. — Reuters KGTL is also exploring investment in rail freight, includ...

The Sindh government has announced that it will bear the medical expenses for those severely injured after a car crashed into a tent of mourners outside an imambargah in Karachi’s Defence Housing Authority (DHA). A teenage girl died, while more than a dozen people were injured after a fast-moving vehicle crashed into a Muharram majlis at Masjid-o-Imambargah Baqiatullah on Sunday night. According to a post on the social media platform X by the Sindh Information Department on Tuesday, the health department has written separate letters to Aga Khan Hospital and South City Hospital. The letters informed the hospitals that the medical expenses of the “severely injured” would be borne by the government. The two hospitals were directed to submit the bills/vouchers to the government after treating the patients. According to the letter, the patients under treatment at Aga Khan hospital included Shabana Bibi, Mehnaz Bibi, Zunaira Fatima, Kousar Parveen, Bibi Irshad, Bibi Mumtaz, Iman Fatima and Fatima Maheen. Meanwhile,...