MULTAN: Eleven schoolchildren and a teacher were injured when the roof of their school collapsed on Saturday.

Sources told Dawn that 37 students of class three and their two teachers were trapped under the rubble when the roof of a private school at Basti Allahwala on Muzaffargarh Road collapsed. Rescue 1122 teams launched the operation to extricate the children and their teachers from rubble with the help of locals.

The rescue staff provided first aid to 25 children and a teacher and shifted the remaining injured to the Nishtar Hospital. The injured were: Sahil, Mariam, Mustafa, Hafza, Zainab Zahoor, Sumeera Arshad, Zara Jamshed, Savaira Bibi, Noor Fatima, Danish Javed, Sadia Umer and school teacher Mansha Saeed. The doctors said the condition of the injured was out of danger.

Commissioner Asadullah Khan, District Coordination Officer Zahid Saleem Gondal, SSP Operations Muhammad Saleem, MNA Abdul Ghaffar Dogar, MPA Rana Mehmoodul Hassan and MNA Javed Ali Shah inspected the school.

Protest as police quiz school owner

As police tried to arrest school owner/principal Akbar Nazeer, people of the area came to his rescue. Later, when the people were dispersed, police once again took the principal into custody and later released him after interrogation.

The DCO told journalists that the chief minister had taken notice of the incident and a committee had been constituted to investigate the incident.

SSP Operations Saleem said a school teacher had been included in the investigation and police would probe the matter.

Meanwhile, people of the area and the representatives of the Private Schools Association (PSA) protested against police for taking the principal into custody. They said there was no justification to arrest the principal when the parents of the injured children had forgiven him.

Farid Bangash of the PSA condemned the arrest of the principal while saying that fitness certificate was issued to the school owner by the relevant authority. He announced a demonstration outside the Multan Press Club against police on Sunday (today).

The Punjab governor inquired after the children at the Nishtar Hospital.

Published in Dawn, May 24th, 2015

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