Purpose Islamic banking was developed to serve two objectives: to replace interest-based loan system with profit and loss sharing investment modes and to promote equity in resource allocation. The first objective is called procedural whereas the second one is termed consequential. Scholars have been debating about the success of Islamic banking in achieving these objectives. This paper aims to develop an index for measuring the extent of convergence between theory and practice of Islamic banking. Design/methodology/approach For measuring the procedural and consequential convergence between objectives and practice of Islamic banking, the paper derives a set of indicators from the celebrated theory of Islamic banking and then develops the methodology of ranking all banks in terms of those indicators. Findings The paper provides ranking of Islamic banks in Pakistan in the light of this index. The results indicate that none of the Islamic banks in Pakistan has been doing good enough to achieve the convergence, instead they are moving in the opposite direction over time. Practical implications Using the methodology developed in this paper, universal ranking of Islamic banks may be issued every year. Originality/value Scholars have proposed some indices for measuring the performance of Islamic banking. There are two basic problems with these proposed measures: they do not directly compare the performance of Islamic banking against its stated objectives and they naively use an additive form of index without explaining the reason for this choice, i.e. as to what are the desirable characteristics which their preferred mathematical form of index serves. The index proposed in this paper attempts to overcome these shortcomings.

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ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: A common surgical emergency is acute appendicitis. Various diagnostic tools are available to diagnosis acute appendicitis. Radiological investigations play an important role in making accurate and early diagnosis and thus preventing morbidity associated with the disease. OBJECTIVE: To determine the diagnostic accuracy of gray scale ultrasonography versus color Doppler in suspected cases of acute appendicitis. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study was carried in the department of Radiology of Mayo Hospital, Lahore. A total of 75 patients were enrolled of age 18-40 years, both genders who were suspected cases of acute appendicitis. All patients underwent baseline investigations along with gray scale ultrasonography and color Doppler. All patients were subjected to surgery to confirm the diagnosis and findings were subjected to statistical analysis. RESULTS: The mean age of the patients was 23.25 ±10.55 and mean transverse diameter of appendix was 8.37 ±3.39. There were 62.7% males and 37.3%females. Findings of gray scale ultrasonography and color Doppler were then correlated with surgical findings to calculate the diagnostic accuracy of these modalities. The results revealed that gray scale ultrasonography sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value and accuracy was 92.7%, 94.32%, 95%, 91.4% and 93.3% respectively, whereas color Doppler had sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value and accuracy of 97.7%, 93.9%, 95.3%, 97% and 96% respectively. Diagnostic accuracy of both modalities together was 98.6%. CONCLUSION: Color Doppler has better diagnostic accuracy than gray scale ultrasonography for diagnosis of acute appendicitis and the combination of both modalities yields diagnostic accuracy that is similar to gold standard.

This paper is an attempt to explain the relationship between subjective elements of social sciences and the framework in which they have evolved and found their research program. We have been encouraged to undertake this exercise by the call for Islamization of social sciences, especially economics, among Muslim scholars. Most of these efforts have begun within the framework of maximization hypothesis. Islamic Economics within neoclassical framework is justified only if neoclassical economics provides some value neutral framework for analyzing economic behavior of an individual which is not the case. Attempts towards Islamization of social sciences fail to understand that social sciences especially economics, offer justification for the capitalistic order overlooking its sociopolitical agenda. This paper explains that all social sciences relate the liberal philosophy to society through symbolic abstract models.

Universal attainment of basic education is recognised as a key development goal; whereas early-age work is considered as a barrier to achieving this goal. The literature suggests that returns to education are larger than those of early-age work, and that child-labour results in long term social loss that reduces human capital. This study evaluates the argument that earlyage work can itself lead to accumulation of human capital when it takes the form of apprenticeship career path. The paper develops a model that allows a rational agent (parent) to compare the early-age work as apprenticeship career path with the formal education career and shows that the parents’ career choice for their child will depend on the lifetime earnings of both careers. The theoretical model is further extended and empirically tested to check whether benefits of education are higher for all levels of education. The simulation analysis suggests that for lower level of education up to Grade-12, the benefits of apprenticeship exceed the net benefits of education whereas, at Grade-12 and beyond, the net benefits of education in terms of earnings outstrip the apprenticeship career. The study implies that early-age work may not necessarily be inefficient when compared with low levels of schooling and that any intervention should ensure universal education for all without compromising skill development of resource poor children. This can be achieved through making skill development complementary to education. JEL Classifications: H44, H52, I26, J24 Keywords: Child-labour, Basic Education, Human Capital, Public Policy