Owais Mughal

Following photo is courtesy of Faisal Jameel.

The boy is seen here taking a dive in the Khanpur Dam lake. According to Faisal‘s photo notes the diving boy had asked his friends to check out his new trick.

The expression on the face of his friend and Faisal‘s timely capture is what made me share this photo here.

Adil Najam

Less thank a week ago I had written that “Uncertainty Rules Pakistan.” Since then the uncertainty has compounded.

I write this just a few hours before the 13th National Assembly meets in Islamabad and nearly a month since the general elections, and there is still no clear sense on who the next Prime Minister will be. In fact, it is not even clear who the Speaker of the National Assembly might be (the Speaker is generally elected before the Prime Minister and one would have assumed that at least this would not be a subject of speculation at this point).

Owais Mughal

World’s largest mammal that ever walked the face of the earth used to live in Pakistan’s Balochistan province. Yes it is true.

This mammal is called Baluchitherium (The Beast of Balochistan). So far the fossils of this mammal have only been found in Baluchistan and Central Asia.

In 1999, a team of French Palaentologists discovered the complete skeleton of this giant mammal in Dera Bugti Hills of Pakistan. The find came as the result of a 5 month long expedition by the French Team in the Balochistan desert.

All in all it was a 5 year long on-and-off study. The French team was led by Professor Jean-Loup Welcomme of the Natural History Museum in Paris. While the first complete skeleton of Baluchitherium was dicscovered in 1999, it was as early as 1846 when first pieces of fossilized Baluchitherium were accidentally stumbled upon in Dera Bugti by a British Army officer who went by the name of Vickary.