The recent incident involving the alleged rape of a college student in Lahore has spiralled into a troubling saga of misinformation, protests and official inquiries. Following social media reports claiming that a young female student was sexually assaulted at a girls’ college in Gulberg, protests erupted, reflecting widespread outrage and concern. However, the aftermath has been marked by police action, injuries among students, and the controversial conclusion of an official inquiry labelling the incident
Child Rights in Focus
PESHAWAR: When parents send their offspring to school, the last thing they expect is for their child to be sexually assaulted on campus by the school watchman, but that is exactly what occurred in Swabi to a fourth-grade girl student. The incident has sparked outrage and protests in the province’s capital city. Police confirmed the 12-year-old girl was targeted within the premises of the school. An FIR was registered at the Kalu Khan police
LAHORE: A high-powered committee established by the Punjab government has released its initial findings regarding the alleged rape of a first-year girl student at a private college in Lahore. On 15 October 2024, the committee led by the home secretary met the alleged victim and her parents for three hours at their home. They recorded statements from 36 individuals including senior officials such as DIG Operations Lahore Faisal Kamran and the college principal, Dr
Karachi: The Sindh High Court (SHC) has directed the chief secretary to constitute a high-level committee to examine whether 10 percent inclusion of students/children coming from the lowest stratum of society is strictly followed and maintained in all such public schools and cadet colleges established through the public exchequer or not. The direction came on a petition against the increase in tuition fees and the non-implementation of the right to free and compulsory education
KARACHI: Female students have grabbed first two positions in the Class XII (Science General Group) annual examinations 2024, according to the results announced by the Board of Intermediate Education Karachi (BIEK) on Tuesday. BIEK Chairman Prof Amir Hussain Qadri said that Maniha Noor Rifat, a student of Aga Khan Higher Secondary School, clinched the first position, securing 998 marks out of 1100. Maryam Rasool from Tabani’s College North Nazimabad Campus came in second with
KARACHI: At a time when Artificial Intelligence (AI) has started dominating all arenas of the global landscape including health and education, students enrolled at government schools in Karachi continue to remain deprived of even the most fundamental technology, computers, which are mandatory for learning and applying the skills of computer science subjects. According to information obtained from the Department of School Education Sindh, out of a total of 499 secondary and higher secondary schools
SAHIWAL: Saddar police failed to recover a 13-year-old labourer allegedly kidnapped by brick kiln owners after his family demanded payment for their work at Chak 41/12-L of tehsil Chichwatni. The victim, Ali Murad, son of Zafar, was allegedly abducted two weeks back. However, Saddar SHO Muddasir Ghaffar told Dawn that this was not a bonded labour kidnap case but a fabricated one. Parveen Bibi, the mother of the boy who also works as a
THIS country’s children make the news for unfortunate reasons. At the core of their plight is the state’s inability to recognise that child rights violations indicate administrative failure and a rejection of our young ones’ existence. The Anti-Kidnap for Ransom Unit of the Lahore Organised Crime Unit and the Azad Kashmir police recently rescued 29 kidnapped children and youth from Kotli district in AJK. Most of the victims, aged between 14 and 20 years,
ISLAMABAD: Globally nearly two million children suffering from severe wasting, also known as acute malnutrition, are at risk of death due to funding shortages for life-saving Ready-to-use-Therapeutic-Food (RUTF) to treat wasting, Unicef warned on 15th October. It stated that Pakistan is included in the 12 hardest-hit countries along with Mali, Nigeria, Chad, Niger, Cameroon, Sudan, Madagascar, Kenya, South Sudan, Congo and Uganda. This year, only 262,000 severely wasted children in Pakistan (one third of
Islamabad: Responding to reports of abuse and harassment against the CEO and commandant of a private cadet college in Hummak, the Child Protection Institute (CPI), in collaboration with the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) administration, conducted a raid and recovered 11 female students from the college hostel. The raid was led by CPI Director General Rabeea Hadi alongside Assistant Deputy Commissioner Mehreen Baloch. During the operation, the team inspected the hostel facilities and found the
ISLAMABAD: Another child has been paralysed by polio in Balochistan, marking the 33rd case of the disease in Pakistan this year, Polio Eradication officials said on 14-October-2024. The latest victim, a 35-month-old boy from Quetta, had not received any routine immunization doses. According to his parents, he received supplementary immunization activity (SIA) doses inconsistently. The child experienced the onset of paralysis on August 22, 2024, despite ongoing vaccination efforts aimed at curbing the wild
The body of a 10-year-old British-Pakistani girl whose death sparked an international manhunt was found with burn marks believed to have been made by an iron, a prosecutor told a London court on October 14. Sara Sharif was found dead in bed at her family home in Woking, southern England, on August 10, 2023. Sara’s stepmother Batool has refused to provide a dental impression for comparison with the bite marks, the prosecutor said. Other