ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Federal Education on Sep 18 directed early completion of the Centre of Excellence for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) to strengthen special and inclusive education through an integrated ecosystem. Secretary Education Nadeem Mahbub visited the under-construction and renovation ASD site to review the progress of work on the project. He was briefed on the physical progress of the project, implementation timelines, outstanding works, human resource planning and overall operational preparedness. According
Child Rights in Focus
BAHAWALPUR: As many as 14 schoolchildren, including nine girls, suffered burns allegedly when some bottles containing an acidic chemical exploded after falling on the floor of the laboratory of a private school at Lodhran. According to Lodhran Rescue 1122 media coordinator Mr Safdar, students from Class I to IV of a private school at Adda Permit near Multan bypass were playing with a ball during recess time in a joint classroom, where bottles of
HYDERABAD: The ‘State of Peasants Rights in Sindh 2025’ report, launched by the Hari Welfare Association (HWA), has described bonded labour as “deeply entrenched” across Sindh with 1,311 labourers having been rescued from brick kilns and agricultural sector. These labourers were rescued in police raids under judicial orders and through emergency interventions, which indicated the scale of exploitation in rural labour systems, the report said. Compiled by the association, the report was released at
• Overall female literacy stands at 47pc, only 27.52pc for rural women • Over 4.08m girls between five and 16 remain out of school • Only 4.34pc in police force, 13.7pc in judiciary • Maternal mortality falls to 224 per 100,000 births • Number of women contesting general elections rises from 23 in 2018 to 53 in 2024 KARACHI: The Sindh government on Sep 18 unveiled its first-ever Gender Parity Report, a landmark assessment
QUETTA: Police on Sep 17 arrested the father of a minor girl from Chaman who was allegedly married to an elderly man in Kuchlak. Efforts were also underway to arrest other people who allegedly played a role in the illegal marriage. Chaman Deputy Commissioner Habib Bangulzai confirmed the arrest of the girl’s father, identified as Abdul Bari. He said the district administration was in contact with Quetta police for registration of an FIR and
ISLAMABAD: At least a dozen kidnapping incidents were registered by the capital police in a single day on Sep 17, police said. In the first incident, three women kidnapped a newborn baby boy from Pims Hospital. The police registered a case under Section 364-A of the Pakistan Penal Code in response to a complaint lodged by the boy’s mother. The police said the women took the boy outside the hospital. However, the incident came
KARACHI: The suspect allegedly involved in the murder of a woman and her three minor children in Sector 7-D of Surjani Town was shot dead by police during an “encounter” on Thursday night, officials said. The suspect, identified as Muhammad Hamayoun Khan, had allegedly murdered Mehwish Danish and her three children — Mirhad, 8, Hasnain, 6, and Ashmeera, 2 — at their home on Sept 14. Speaking at a press conference at his office earlier
RAWALPINDI: The Punjab Emergency Operations Centre has called for sustained efforts to stop poliovirus transmission through high-quality vaccination, effective surveillance and community engagement with a renewed focus on addressing misinformation and rumours surrounding polio vaccination. To strengthen the use of credible medical voices in responding to misinformation, a task force of doctors will be established to provide accurate, evidence-based information to parents and communities. The emphasis was placed during a workshop on polio eradication
GUJAR KHAN: Rescue 1122 divers recovered the bodies of two sisters while the search for their brother was underway in a canal near the Jhelum River, after their father allegedly threw all three children into the canal. The father has been arrested by Mangla police of Jhelum district. According to District Police Officer (DPO) Jhelum Shafiq Chaudhry, the mother reported to police that she had estranged relations with her husband and was living with
PAKISTAN’S health system is trapped in a loop of doom. A localised electrical failure caused the blaze that killed 14 newborns at the Pims nursery, says an inquiry committee’s report about last month’s tragedy in Islamabad. It holds the hospital management responsible for systemic and institutional collapse due to which the fire morphed into a calamity. More specifically, it suspects that either abnormal electrical heating due to excessive current, a high-resistance connection, or another
KARACHI: Despite the passage of nine days since the murder of 17-year-old Rosham Hussain, his family has yet to bury him, as they insist that they will neither offer his funeral prayers nor lay him to rest until his killers are arrested. The family, along with Rosham’s friends, acquaintances and a large number of the residents, has been holding a sit-in outside the Manghopir police station to demand the arrest of those responsible for his
ISLAMABAD: A parliamentary body on Sep 16 rejected a “flawed” report on the catastrophic fire at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) that claimed 14 infant lives as Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif ordered authorities to complete reforms at Pims within three months. The Performance Audit Report found only 39.7 per cent compliance against the acceptable benchmark of 90pc among the indicators assessed. The prime minister was chairing a meeting on a roadmap for improving the hospital,