TOBA TEK SINGH: Five out of the 12 workers, including a 12-yearold boy, who had suffered burns in a steam boiler explosion in a textile mills located on Sargodha Road near motorway M-4 at Faisalabad on April 20, succumbed to their injuries on 23rd April night and 24th April. The deceased workers include a minor boy Salman (12), his father Fayyaz (40), residents of Bahawalnagar, Waseem (18) and Mustansar (24), both of Arifwala and
Child Rights in Focus
ISLAMABAD: Education Minister Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui on 23rd April 2024 said challenges of education could not be addressed until the provinces and the federation worked in unison. He highlighted the importance of ensuring that all stakeholders were on the same page and owned the direction taken by the federal government in resolving the current challenges of the education sector. The minister said access to quality education, teacher training and infrastructural and curriculum limitations
RAWALPINDI: The District Education Authority Rawalpindi has issued a notification for the establishment of school councils or school management committees. The number of council members will be a minimum of nine and a maximum of 17. According to the notification issued by CEO Yasin Baloch, the committee in each school will comprise two notables of the area, a retired schoolteacher, one member each from the armed forces and civil services, two members from parents
Whenever the country is hit by an economic crisis, news media starts brimming with reports of children abandoned by parents, inside garbage cans and at shrines, out of which only a lucky few end up in the custody of trusted orphanages or doting adoptive parents, the rest however, are left stranded at the mercy of wild stray dogs and illegal shelter homes. In Punjab, several shelter homes are working at the government and non-government
PESHAWAR: Experts have called upon policymakers to integrate mental health services into primary care settings to scale up awareness and reduce stigma associated with mental health illnesses among people. At the concluding session of fourth International Public Health Conference at Khyber Medical University (KMU) on 20 April 2024, they termed strengthening primary healthcare important to put brakes on increasing number of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in the country. Health Secretary Mahmood Aslam Wazir, who was
April is recognised as the Sexual Assault Awareness Month globally. In Pakistan, though, sexual awareness remains a controversial topic and it is often falsely equated with promoting immorality and indecency. In reality, it is to the contrary and sexual awareness plays a pivotal role in preventing sexual violence, which is rampant in our society. Sexual violence in general, and against minors in particular, is a crime that is under-reported, with an extremely low conviction
ISLAMABAD: While every year 600,000 children die in the emergency room (ER) across the country, the number can be reduced by 50 per cent by pumping just a nominal amount of money (Rs2,000 per child) to improve the emergency response. Child Life Foundation Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Dr Ahsan Rabbani made these remarks in a conversation with Dawn. ‘It is unfortunate that the number of children who die in the ER is more than
LAHORE: In the wake of rapid technological advancement and rising cybercrime , the Punjab home department has prepared a first draft of the “Punjab Cyber Crime Control, Prevention and Punishment Act, 2024.” The first draft of the proposed cybercrime control law has for the first time identified all kinds of offences, including electronic financial frauds, fraudulent sales through online auctions or retail sites or through fake websites, mass marketing frauds and consumer scams. In
Communication is a big part of being human, starting from gestures to the many languages we use today. Over time, we got better at communicating with graphics, alphabets and modern electronic media. However, Pakistan recently faced a challenge – not having enough qualified professionals in Speech Language Pathology (SLP). Out of 240 million people, over 22 million suffer from speech, language, swallowing or hearing disorders. This scarcity accentuates the urgent necessity to tackle communication
The Non-Formal Education Statistics Report 2021-22 is a report jointly organized by Pakistan Institute for Education-PIE, Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training & JICA-AQAL Project to present a clear picture of statistics to all stakeholders, including lawmakers, policymakers, educationists, and researchers. The report includes the following statistics: 81% of students registered in NFE are registered with government NFE organizations, while the remaining 19% are registered with private or development sector organizations 36% of
ISLAMABAD: Education Minister Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui said on 17 April that the ministry was working on a programme to declare an education emergency in the country to tackle the issue of out of school children (OOSC). He stated this while talking to British High Commissioner to Pakistan Jane Marriott, who called on him at the ministry. The meeting was attended by Country Director British Council James Hampson and Secretary Education Mohyuddin Wani. The minister
SEHAT Sahulat is a great programme but universal health coverage has a much larger vision. Sehat Sahulat is a state-financed health insurance system for the curative care of hospitalised patients, whereas UHC means healthcare for all. After the universalisation of the Sehat Sahulat programme in the federal areas, KP and Punjab, the term `universal health insurance` is increasingly being used in policy discussions. Many senior policymakers bureaucrats and politicians continue to equate UHI with