Zakat on Non-Agricultural Land Plots: Public Awareness and Fiscal Reforms

Zakat is although a compulsory obligation in Islam but is not paid compulsorily by the people. There are two main reasons; one is the ignorance about many things on which zakat is due, for example non-agricultural land and commercial plots etc. andsecond, ignorance about the mechanism through which it is paid. Thefirst aspect is related to public awareness and second aspect is related to the fiscal policy being enforced by the government collecting property and wealth taxes thus putting heavyfinancial pressure on the owners of real estate so as to compel them to avoid zakat andpay taxes. The paper explores the level of awareness among the general public about the payment ofzakat on non-agricultural land. Itfurther addresses the question that how the existing revenue structure need to be changed. For thefirst aspect, primary data with n=33 has been collected from the capital city of the province Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. For the second aspect the revenue structure of the government is reviewed tofind out the number of taxes on the possession, sale and purchase of commercial or nonagricultural land plots. Since taxes are in no way a substitute of zakat so it is further explored that if the existing taxes are replaced and zakat system would be properly enforced then how much is the net return. In order to estimate this net return, an interview has been conducted from the property dealers and also the figures are taken from government accounts to calculate a sample for the study area that is then generalized for the government returns at large. The results of the study show a high level ofignorance about zakat obligation on plots in the study area. The verdicts of the Islamic scholars also create difference of opinion, however, majority have approved the case in favor of payment. Since there is ignorance and people have to pay taxes so they avoid zakat and just pay taxes. A mechanism is needed for fiscal reforms to ensure the payment of zakat and to stop its substitution against taxes on land plots.

Developing Students’ Relational Understanding in Mathematics

The teaching of mathematics, even in the selective private schools in Pakistan, is done in a traditional fashion. This kind of teaching helps students follow pre-ordained rules, transmitted by the teacher, without understanding the rationales for them. The consequence is that students develop proficiency in procedural skills but lack reasoning and thinking capacity in mathematics. This study was designed to investigate how a small sample of upper primary school students could be helped to develop a relational understanding of some basic number concepts. Using an action-research approach these students were engaged in a set of mathematical activities which allowed the researcher to trace their thinking. Data collection in this study occurred in three stages. At the Pre-Intervention stage semi-structured interviews and classroom observations were conducted to ascertain how students learned and were taught mathematics in their school context. During the Intervention stage the researcher set students various mathematical activities to help trace their mathematical thinking and learning. At the Post-Intervention stage students discussed in small groups both, the helping and the constraining factors in developing their relational understanding in mathematics. The findings that emerged were that multiple representations, the appropriate use of mathematical language and students' efforts to justify their claims helped them learn to reason mathematically. However, the teacher's own inadequacies in mathematical concepts and the limitations of words and pictures in representing abstract mathematical ideas sometimes constrained what the students could learn.