POLIO has emerged as a major challenge in Pakistan. It is not simply a challenge in the health sector, but has also become both a security and political issue. It has been reported that 74 polio cases emerged in the country last year. Pakistan now has the dubious distinction of being one of the two remaining countries in the world — the other being Afghanistan — that is hosting a debilitating disease that leaves
Child Rights in Focus
MUZAFFARGARH: The deputy commissioner has asked the Chief Executive Officer of Education Miss Mah Jabeen to look into reports that a government school for special children in Alipur has expelled a class five student for being transgender. DC Quratul Ain promised action against responsible officials if the transgender allegation was true. Shahid Ali’s mother submitted an application with the deputy commissioner office and claimed the school administration had given “no reasonable reason” for expelling
Malala Yousafzai visits school, meets family in Shangla SHANGLA: Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai on March 5 visited her hometown Barkana in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Shangla district for the first time since surviving an assassination attempt by the Taliban in 2012. During her visit, Malala met family members and paid respects at her ancestral graveyard. She also visited her uncle, Ramazan, who recently underwent heart surgery in Islamabad. Karora Station House Officer (SHO) Amjad Alam Khan
No action taken on fact-finding committee’s report on low pass percentage in Karachi KARACHI: The Government of Sindh has put the issue of low grades of thousands of intermediate students in Karachi on the backburner. After protests by students and voices raised by the opposition members in the Sindh Assembly on this issue, a notification was issued to form an investigative committee headed by Sindh Education Minister Syed Sardar Shah, comprising members of the
A sessions court has sentenced a man to three-year imprisonment for sexually abusing a teenage boy. Sunil Anthony, alias Sunny, was found guilty of assaulting the 13-year-old boy at the former’s residence in Azam Town within the jurisdiction of the Mehmoodabad police station in October 2023. Additional Sessions Judge (South) Abdul Zahoor awarded three years of rigorous imprisonment to the accused for offence punishable under the Section 377 (unnatural offence) of the Pakistan Penal
PESHAWAR: Peshawar High Court on 4th March temporarily stopped Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Textbook Board (KPTBB) from executing profit-sharing contracts with eight private publishers for publishing of textbooks for grade 9 to 12. A bench consisting of Justice Wiqar Ahmad and Justice Sabitullah Khan issued notices to the respondents including the KPTBB chairman, secretary of elementary and secondary education and National Curriculum Council (NCC), seeking their response to a plea of three private publishers challenging the
ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Federal Education and Khan Academy have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to introduce personalised learning in schools through Khan Academy’s AI-powered tutor, Khanmigo. Khan Academy will train teachers of the Federal Directorate of Education (FDE) to effectively utilise Khanmigo, ensuring a seamless integration of technology in classrooms. This initiative is poised to be a game-changer in education reforms, providing students with a tailored learning experience that caters to their
Beyond policy measures, there must be a fundamental shift in how daughters are perceived in society. The bodies of five newborn girls, discarded like garbage and mutilated by stray animals in Sialkot, reveal a horrifying reality of Pakistan’s deep-seated disregard for female life. This is a symptom of a society’s moral deprivation, where daughters are still seen as burdens, where gender preference is so deeply entrenched that some choose to kill rather than raise
GUJRANWALA: A joint team of the district administration and Metropolitan Corporations (MC) on 3rd March sealed more than 40 private schools being run in residential buildings. The team was led by City Assistant Commissioner (AC) Iqra Mobeen Gondal, while MC Chief Officer Haider Chattha accompanied her. The AC said that the team sealed schools located in Satellite Town, on DC Road and Sialkot Bypass over their illegal operations in residential buildings. She said these
KARACHI: Unknown criminals kidnapped a 12-year-old girl in Surjani Town, subjected her to sexual assault and torture before throwing her out of a car in the Scheme-33 area on 3rd March, police said. Surjani Town SHO Ghulam Husain Pirzada said the girl had left her home in Yusuf Goth on March 2 to purchase something from a nearby shop, but she could not return. Her family informed the police who launched a search and
A case was registered against an unidentified individual LAHORE: The corpse of a newborn child was found on a garbage heap in Mozang. According to Edhi Foundation officials, the body was found abandoned on a roadside garbage heap. Upon information about the incident, Mozang police took the body into custody and arranged its burial at Miani Sahib graveyard with the help of Edhi volunteers. A case was registered against an unidentified individual and the
Islamabad: Child-centred approach in the judiciary was stressed at a high-level event titled “Promoting and Protecting Child Rights through Improved Legal Literacy and Education in Pakistan” hosted by Group Development Pakistan (GDP). The initiative was part of a wider ‘Reimagine Justice for Children in Pakistan’ programme, and was launched in collaboration with the National Commission for Human Rights (NCHR), with support from the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The project aims to enhance legal