perspective-child rights - Page 11

Insights From the 2023 Census Report

The 2023 Census conducted by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics released its complete report in July 2024 indicates that the total population of Pakistan is 240 million out of which the population of children under 18 is 112 Million (47% of the total population). Children Population (under 18) Population under 18 Total Male Female Transgender Pakistan 112,472,700 58,099,978 54,370,121 2,601…

Transport For Schooling

A JUDGE at the Lahore High Court recently ordered that schools should arrange for and organise transport for schoolchildren by the end of the winter break. The order came in the hearings on the case about smog in Lahore. The use of public transport for schooling is expected to reduce vehicular traffic…

The Age Of Consent And The Borders Of Belief

ICT Child Marriage Restraint Act, 2025 marks a pivotal step toward a…

The Case for Teaching Punjabi in Schools

THE chief minister of Punjab, Ms Maryam Nawaz, has said that Punjabi…

HIV/AIDS Warning

EACH year, World AIDS Day arrives with new statistics but an old question: why is HIV/AIDS still a critical problem? Despite decades of interventions, glaring inequalities and complacency remain the primary reasons for the elevated numbers. UNAIDS says 40.8m people are living with HIV globally, 9.2m are not “accessing antiretroviral…

Ghost Commitments: Pakistan’s Child Rights Crisis

This year on Universal Children’s Day, as Pakistan prepares for its 2025 review by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, I’m forced to reflect on a 35-year-old promise. In 1990, Pakistan was one of the six initiators of the World Summit for Children, a champion for the…

Empowered Teachers

IN the developing world, teachers have a role that extends well beyond that of educators. The change that teachers bring about not only impacts their students’ academic attainment, it also has ripple effects on their students’ families in many ways. Education is a critical tool of social development and, as…

Schools or Brands

Private education has over the years steadily morphed into a profit-maximising business, overshadowing its core mission of learning and development. This shift has taken such precedence that many schools today consider themselves brands first and educational institutions second — complete with branded uniforms and study packs. It is this unchecked…

Rampant Drug Abuse

THE rising abuse of an anticonvulsant medication in the market is destroying the lives of the country’s youth. The drug, whose generic name is pregabalin and which is available under different brand names, decreases the number of pain signals that are sent out by damaged nerves in the body. Young…

Who Gets Educated?

Across Pakistan’s towns and cities, families wrestle with agonising choices each month: which bill to pay, which cost to delay and, increasingly, whether to keep paying school fees. After rent and food, little remains. For many households, that scarcity means deciding which child gets to stay in school. More often…

For the Children

WORLD Children’s Day is upon us, yet countless children are denied even simple rights that should never be in question. This year’s call to “listen to children and stand up for their rights” feels painfully apt. Millions of children wake up each day to fear and uncertainty. In conflict zones,…

Our Sanitation Crisis

At some point in their lives, those who call this country home would have had to go through the experience of being outside when nature calls in the full knowledge that there are few, if any, public toilets nearby. While most men would still be able to make do in…

Children Bear Brunt of Worsening Climate Crisis

LAHORE: The phrase “climate change” usually brings to mind flooded plains, destroyed crops and lost livelihoods. Yet the true victims of natural calamities are the children whose hopes for the future are washed away by melting glaciers. Fourteen-year-old Ayesha has witnessed climate disasters terrible enough to drain the colours of…

Ignoring Diabetes

WORLD Diabetes Day arrives as new research sheds light on the extent of discrimination Pakistanis living with diabetes encounter — including children who will eventually become part of a workforce unprepared to support them. The International Diabetes Federation’s latest survey, placing Pakistan at the top of global workplace bias, should…