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Eight other children were injured and being treated at a
hospital, senior police official Faisal Kamran said, adding that
the owner of the tutoring center and another person have been
arrested.
Kamran said rescuers were searching through the rubble after
receiving reports that more children could be trapped beneath
the debris. He said the tutoring center was housed in an aging
building and that the roof of an unfinished second floor
apparently collapsed because of poor construction quality.
Building collapses are common in Pakistan, where construction
standards are often poorly enforced. Many structures are built
with substandard materials, and safety regulations are
frequently ignored to reduce costs.
Witnesses said ambulances and rescue workers rushed to the scene
after the roof collapsed. Residents also joined the search,
using shovels and their bare hands to remove rubble in an effort
to reach children trapped beneath the debris.
Hours later, as the bodies of the children were being handed
over to their families, scenes of anguish unfolded outside
hospitals and in the neighborhood on the outskirts of Lahore
where the private tutoring center was located in a house.
Parents wept over the loss of their children, while mothers and
other female relatives cried and beat their chests in grief.
Most of the victims lived nearby, and funeral prayers were
expected later Tuesday.
Grief was mixed with anger as residents demanded stern
punishment for the owner of the tutoring center, blaming him for
operating classes in what they described as an aging and unsafe
building. Dozens of mourners were seen gathering outside the
victims’ homes to offer condolences.
“We don’t know whose home to visit first to offer condolences
for the loss of their children,” resident Zafar Iqbal said as he
moved from one bereaved family’s home to another nearby street.
Lahore is the capital of Pakistan's most populous Punjab
province, where many parents send their children to private
tutoring centers in the afternoon and evening.
Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz
Sharif expressed grief over the collapse of the roof of an
evening school building in Lahore. In separate statements, they
offered condolences to the families of the victims, prayed for
the speedy recovery of those injured, and said effective safety
measures were needed to prevent similar tragedies.
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Associated Press writer K.M. Chaudhry in Lahore contributed to
this story.
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