AT LEAST 30 children, most of them younger than 13, and a teacher have died in Peshawar after the roof of their private school collapsed during morning classes. Dozens more were injured, some critically.
The victims had arrived at the Al Khair school expecting an ordinary day. Instead, rescue workers spent hours searching through rubble as parents gathered outside. Police say the building was structurally weak and its roof overloaded with additional construction. The owner has been arrested, while an inquiry is under way. These preliminary findings demand scrutiny. So do reports that concerns about the building’s condition had previously been raised. In June, 14 children died when the roof of a tuition centre collapsed in Lahore’s Kahna area. Two days later, another school roof collapse in Baghbanpura killed an eight-year-old. Three incidents in a few months should be enough to force an examination of the places where Pakistan’s children are taught.
Across the country, schools and tuition centres operate in buildings ill-suited to accommodating large numbers of pupils. In crowded urban neighbourhoods, houses are converted into classrooms, sometimes with additional floors, makeshift rooms, and roofs carrying more weight than they were designed to support.
Yet questions about construction quality, structural approvals, and inspections are too often left unanswered until a disaster occurs. The Lahore inquiry found that the Kahna tuition centre operated from an unregistered residential house. Peshawar presents a troubling contrast: according to the KP private schools regulator, Al Khair was registered in March, but technical personnel were absent from its inspection.
If a school can receive registration without a structural assessment, what assurance does that certificate provide? Investigators must establish whether alterations were authorised, who inspected the premises, and whether warnings were received and ignored. They must also examine the regulators’ role, not merely the decisions of school management.
The KP authorities’ decision to establish district-level committees to inspect private school buildings is welcome, but its value will depend on what follows. The committees have been instructed to examine buildings, identify hazards, and submit reports within three days. Authorities must make the findings public, close premises posing danger, and require independent engineering clearance before they reopen. Similar checks are needed across every province, including at tuition centres and schools operating inside residential properties. Building permission, school registration, and periodic safety certification should be linked, with clear responsibility assigned to qualified inspectors. Owners who make dangerous alterations must face consequences, as must officials found to have neglected their duties. Parents should not have to become structural engineers to judge whether their children are safe at school. After so many deaths, another round of condolences and inquiries without enforcement would be an intolerable response.
Published in Dawn, October 16th, 2026