• NCRC recommends boosting NCCIA capacity, setting up special units for exploitation probes • Proposes Peca review from child rights perspective • Urges integrating age verification into Digital Nation Pakistan Act ISLAMABAD: Protecting minors from online grooming, exploitation and harmful content is the state’s responsibility, the National Commission on the Rights of Child (NCRC) told the Islamabad High Court while proposing sweeping legal and institutional reforms to safeguard children on social media. In a
Child Rights in Focus
KARACHI: Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on Oct 2 ordered a province-wide enrolment drive to bring out-of-school children back to classrooms on the pattern of the Thatta pilot model, where 702 students, including 409 girls and 102 out-of-school and dropout children, were enrolled in just nine days from Sept 21 to 30 in five newly upgraded schools. He was presiding over a meeting to review the progress of the Sindh Secondary Education Improvement
LAHORE: A judicial magistrate on Sep 30 sent a teenage suspect to jail on a 14-day judicial remand in a case of allegedly attempting to poison his father after seeking information about poisoning from artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots. The National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) produced the 17-year-old suspect before Judicial Magistrate Naeem Wattoo on the completion of his three-day physical remand. The magistrate asked the investigating officer (IO) whether the suspect’s father had
LAHORE: In a major step toward updating centuries-old personal laws, the Punjab Assembly Standing Committee on Human Rights and Minority Affairs on Sep 30 unanimously approved the Christian Marriage Bill 2026, raising the minimum legal age of marriage for both bride and groom to 18 years and paving the way for mandatory official registration with Nadra (National Database and Registration Authority) and local union councils. The meeting, chaired by MPA Raheela Khadam Hussain, approved
QUETTA: Allah Dad, a resident of Dalbandin, along with his wife, has appealed to the Balochistan chief minister and top officials to transfer the case of rape and murder of their seven-year-old daughter in Noshki to the Special Court for Violence Against Women and Children in Quetta. Speaking at a press conference here, Mr Dad said that last month he and his family had travelled from Dalbandin to Noshki to attend the fateha of
RAWALPINDI: Following the school van fire incident in Murree, the City Traffic Police has formed special squads to check fire safety arrangements in public service and school vans to prevent such incidents in future. A spokesman for the City Traffic Police Murree said in a press release that, on the orders of District Police Officer Murree Raza Tanveer Sipra and Chief Traffic Officer Murree Munir Ahmed Hashmi, special squads of traffic wardens had been formed to
ISLAMABAD: A 17-month-old girl in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Bannu division tested positive for poliovirus, taking this year’s tally of cases from across the country to five. Among the five cases confirmed so far in the country, four have been detected in Bannu division alone while a single case was reported in Sindh, an official of the National Emergency Operations Centre confirmed to Dawn on Tuesday. The latest case is from the Khandar Khankhel UC of
PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Textbook Board plans to change the textbooks for each grade in line with the semester system recently introduced in public and private schools. “The decision to change the course books of each grade has been taken after the implementation of semester system in schools by elementary and secondary education department,” officials told Dawn. They said that not only the size of books would be reduced but also a couple of
KARACHI: Nineteen days after he was shot dead during a house robbery in Manghopir, family and relatives of 17-year-old Rosham Hussain ended their protest sit-in outside the Manghopir police station and buried their loved one in a local graveyard on Sep 27. His funeral prayer was offered at a ground near the Attock petrol pump in Manghopir and was attended by a large number of people, including the deceased’s family members, relatives, area residents and
In my classroom, I encounter students who are more concerned with securing marks than acquiring knowledge. Some have learned to memorise answers, while others believe grades could be secured through influence or money. Parents, too, often measure educational success by examination scores and admission to prestigious university programmes. The result is an education culture in which certificates matter more than competence and grades matter more than genuine learning. While conducting research into why Pakistan
PESHAWAR: All Primary Teachers Association (APTA) Khyber Pakhtunkhwa president Azizullah Khan has urged the provincial government to complete the regularisation of 14,000 teachers at the earliest and implement its decision to upgrade primary school teachers. Talking to reporters here on Friday, he said a separate directorate for primary education was also needed to improve administration and address the issues confronting 27,626 schools, 5.65 million students and 96,990 primary teachers across the province. Mr Khan
PAKISTAN’S students do not need voluminous textbooks especially in the early stages; they need better learning. The Punjab government’s decision to revise the curriculum from pre-primary to Grade 5, reduce textbook volume by 25pc, and shift students away from rote learning is therefore a welcome step. The current education system has confused the amount of content covered with learning. Crowded textbooks and examination practices have compelled children to memorise the text rather than understand