He was speaking to the media after a meeting with the divisional commissioner.

The environment secretary urged the citizens, meanwhile, to use available laws to seek action against those they found involved in activities that aid breeding of dengue mosquitoes.

He said the Local Government Ordinance, the Punjab Epidemic Disease Act, the Punjab Environmental Protection Act and Criminal Procedures Code provided a legal framework for action against such violators.

The secretary said the government had accelerated an awareness raising campaign through door-to-door visits, corner meetings, lectures at schools and colleges and distribution of pamphlets containing guidelines on prevention of dengue fever.

Secretary Wahla also briefed the media about the insecticides, fogging machines, spray machines and other equipment provided to district administrations.

He urged people to avoid keeping old tyres in the open. He said the tyres should be shredded before dumping. He asked the tehsil municipal officials to carry out regular monitoring of areas where old tyre businesses were located.

He said inspections should be undertaken regularly for dengue mosquito larvae at places where there is still water.

Earlier, Commissioner Tahir Hussain expressed satisfaction with the anti-dengue measures in the four districts of Faisalabad division.

Two-day conference on dengue fever from Sept 24

A two-day conference on dengue fever prevention and treatment will begin at the Punjab Medical College on September 24.

The PMC and the University of Agriculture Faisalabad (UAF) will jointly organise the conference.

This was announced on Friday at a meeting of the PMC’s dengue awareness committee.

Dr Khurram Sohail Raja, a committee member, briefed the participants of the meeting about its ongoing activities.

He said a publicity campaign for the conference would be started soon.

Dr Muhammad Jalal Arif of the UAF said his university was planning to hold another event to educate people about dengue fever prevention. He said people from various backgrounds, in particular youngsters, would be invited to the discussion.

Dr Humaira Arshad of the PMC was asked to approach colleges for women and urge them to hold public awareness seminars at their premises.

The committee also decided to approach industrialists for financial assistance for its activities.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 16^th, 2012.

Prof Masood Sadiq Butt, the principal investigator at the section, said the facility would be used to undertake research on the commercial use of fruits, vegetables and edible roots.

He said currently they were conducting research on cumin seeds, garlic, ginger, black and green tea leaves and water melon.

He said researchers at the centre were studying the possible use of these in the treatment of cancer.

He said a cell culture laboratory would soon be established at the centre to conduct more experiments on the anti-cancer potential of different food products.

He said the UAF would market these products for treatment of diseases once research on their nutraceutical (a termed derived from the words nutrition and pharmaceutical for food items with health and medical benefits) use was completed.

He said the university would also urge farmers to grow products with medicinal uses to increase their earnings.

He said they were considering arranging sessions with farmers in villages surrounding Faisalabad to promote the activity.

The principal investigator said these products were most suitable for treatment of diseases like hyperglycemia (high levels of sugar in blood) and hypercholesterolemia (high levels of cholesterol in blood).

He said in the long-run the centre’s objective was to undertake research on enough food products to promote diet based therapy in the country.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 11^th, 2012.

A protest demonstration was held a week ago by Anjuman Faroogh Darood-o-Salam against the police for not entertaining their complaint against the suspect, Sajjad Masih, accused of sending blasphemous text messages to AFDS president Rana Muhammad Tariq and several other clerics.

Tariq pleaded that while an FIR had already been registered in the matter on SHO Muhammad Sarfraz’s complaint, he suspected the police would withdraw the case and release Sajjad without prosecution. He said police should be directed to register a case on his complaint.

FIRs have been registered in the matter under Sections 295-C (Use of derogatory remarks in respect of the Holy Prophet) and 295-B (Defiling of Holy Quran) of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and 25-D of the Telegraph Act.

Tariq and other clerics had been protesting for four months over some blasphemous text messages they had received from unidentified number. A number of clerics and prayer leaders had received messages blaspheming against the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him). Before moving court, they had filed a complaint for the registration of a case against the sender of the messages. It was turned down by the police on grounds that the suspect had already been arrested and a case registered against them.

Meanwhile, Sajjad has been confined at district jail on judicial remand since December 30, 2011. He was arrested by Gojra City police on December 18 after Alina* Masih, 18, his ex-fiancé, and her family accused him of sending the blasphemous messages from the number registered in her name.

The girl and her family were held by police after they traced the SIM card to the girl, a resident of a Christian locality in Gojra. SHO Sarfaraz said they had sought assistance from officials of intelligence agencies to trace the number. The girl’s family complained that they were held at the police station for over a month from November 7 till Sajjad’s arrest on December 18. The police denied this charge. They said the family was only called to the police station for questioning.

SHO Sarfraz told The Express Tribune that Sajjad had admitted to having sent the messages from a number he had obtained in the girl’s name. “He (Sajjad) said he wanted to implicate the woman in a blasphemy case to avenge her for breaking engagement with him,” the SHO said.

“He said the girl had left him to get married to a family member who was settled in the United Kingdom,” he added.

The suspect said he had used a photocopy of the girl’s computerised identity card (CNIC) she had left at his house to obtain the subscriber identity module (SIM) card, which he later used to send blasphemous messages to several clerics and prayer leaders.

Two Christians were set on fire during riots in the area in August 2009. Dozens of Christian families were forced to leave their homes and flee Gojra. Their houses and churches were also burned by rioters.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 3^rd, 2012.

JHANG: Following a blasphemy case being registered against Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Cultural Editor of Danish Newspaper Fleming Rose, another blasphemy case has been registered at the Kotwali police station in Jhang against websites and Florida Pastors Terry Jones and Wayne Sapp.

An FIR No.234/12 was registered on the order of the Jhang  Session Judge Arshad Masood, acting on the application of Advocate Aamir Mehmood Shakir Noal. The fresh case charge social media websites Facebook, YouTube, search engine Google, along with Terry Jones of State of Florida Church, Pastor Wayne Sapp, Florida Church and President Pakistan Telecommunication Authority for using derogatory remarks with respect to the Holy Prophets (Peace be Upon Them).

The advocate had in his application termed the derogatory remarks as war among Muslims and non-Muslims and a kind of international terrorism.

The complainant contended in his petition that “he visited the bar room of the district bar association Jhang along with his colleagues. He visited websites YouTube, Facebook, Google and found that the Holy Quran had been burnt by Pastor Wayne Sapp on the order of Terry Jones in a Florida Church on March 20, 2011.”

“The burning was carried out by Pastor Wayne Sapp under the supervision of Terry Jones who last September drew sweeping condemnation over this plan to ignite a pile of Quran pages on the anniversary of 9/11” Noal contended.

The event was presented as a trial of book (Holy Quran) while the Quran was found guilty and then ‘executed’.

The jury deliberated for about eight minutes. The Holy Quran had been soaking for an hour in kerosene, before it was put on a tray in the centre of the Church and Pastor Sapp set it alight with a barbeque lighter.

“The book Holy Quran was burnt for around 10 minutes while some on lookers posed for photos,” Noal said.

He added that he saw the video of the incident along with his colleagues including Advocate Mehtab Ahmad and Advocate Niaz Ahmad Ranjha on above mentioned websites.

Noal claimed that by burning the Quran, the name of Hazrat Mohammad (PBUH) including along with the names of other prophets such as Hazrat Ibrahim (Abraham) (PBUH), Hazrat Musa (Moses) (PBUH) and Hazrat Essa (Jesus) (PBUH) were defiled.

“They are guilty of offence of blasphemy under sections 295-A, 295-B and 295-C. The act of the accused falls within the territory of Pakistan. Due to such mischief, I along with all Muslims felt great anger and it also trespasses against the Muslim world. Try to create war among Muslims and non-Muslims. Moreover, it is a kind of international terrorism,” the advocate asserted.

The petitioner claimed that the accused can be persecuted through Cameron Munter, the Ambassador of US based in Islamabad.