ISLAMABAD: Parents of the victims of the terrorist attack on Peshawar’s Army Public School (APS) have urged President Mamnoon Hussain to order a judicial inquiry and grant highest civil awards for the children and teachers who lost their lives in the incident.

“We have handed over our demands in writing to the president during the meeting,” Ajoon Khan, secretary general of the APS Shuhada Forum, said after an eight-member delegation met the president here on Monday.

The delegation also met Senate Chairman Raza Rabbani and Senator Mushahid Hussain, chief of the Standing Committee on Defence, and apprised them of their grievances. They alleged that a discriminatory treatment had been meted out to them by the civil and military authorities.

Take a look: Parents of APS attack victims hail SC verdict on military courts

Ajoon Khan told Dawn that the parents wanted a judicial commission to investigate the attack so that the officials responsible for the huge security lapse should be punished.

Terrorists belonging to the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan attacked the APS on Dec 16, 2014, killing 145 people, including 132 children.

Mr Khan said the government had awarded Tamgha-i-Shujaat to the children in March, which they had received ‘under protest’ because it had no match with the sacrifice they had rendered in the war against terrorism. He alleged that two schoolteachers who were wives of military officials had been awarded Sitara-i-Shujaat although they were in the same auditorium where the others were killed. “We want to see an end to such discrimination,” he said.

He called for announcement of the highest official award or a new, unique award for the martyred children and teachers to recognise their sacrifice.

He said the delegation had asked the president to allot land in Islamabad to set up a Shuhada university in memory of the victims.

Published in Dawn, August 18th, 2015

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