KP begins booking school owners

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police have lodged cases against owners and principals of a large number of schools all over the province after they failed to adopt adequate security measures to counter possible attacks on their institutions like that of the Army Public School.
The action is being taken under the KP Sensitive and Vulnerable Places Security Act 2015, which was passed by the KP Assembly recently.“I have directed officials to lodge cases against those who did not take proper security steps for the protection of schools and schoolchildren,” Inspector General of Police (IGP) Nasir Khan Durrani told The News. He added that owners and principals of dozens of schools had been booked under the relevant law during the last three days.
The KP Police chief added that all these schools were issued warning for not adopting proper security measures. “They were directed to improve security of their buildings as well as buses and vans to protect the lives of children, teachers and other staff members,” he pointed out.
Special committees at the sub-divisional level are inspecting schools in their areas to monitor the security of private and public sector schools, colleges and universities. The committees issue warnings to principals and owners after inspecting the educational institutions. They are directed them to upgrade their security.
“We lodged cases against 64 schools in different parts of Peshawar till Wednesday,” SSP Operations Dr Mian Saeed Ahmad told The News.He added that almost all those booked were heading private schools in different parts of the provincial capital. However, he said those booked are not being arrested at the moment.
According to an official, security inspection of 1,119 educational institutions was carried out on Wednesday and various institutions were advised to further beef up security around their schools.
The Khyber Pakhtunkwha government and police had directed the management of public and private schools all over the province to arrange for their security to assist police in thwarting any terrorist attack like that of the December 16 incident that killed 146 people, including 134 students, at the Army Public School.
The schools’ management was directed to hire guards, install CCTV cameras and metal detectors and raise boundary walls. They were also directed to ensure security of the school buses and vans.