Senator Ishaq Dar refuted the information carried in daily Pakistan Today in its news item ‘Students up in arms against Punjab government’, published on October 23, according to which Dr Majid Naeem (an IT consultant at Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education) was his close relative. Senator Dar said he was irresponsibly impugned and the IT consultant was not related to him. He said Pakistan Today’s allegation was baseless and fabricated. The senator said he strongly believed in upholding merit and transparency and his past record reflected that. He said his relatives were not legally permitted to be a part of the federal or provincial government departments. Dr Majid Naeem was neither related to nor associated with him, Dar added. He said that it was the correspondent’s moral obligation to have consulted him to investigate the matter further before levelling such an allegation on him.