PHC summons KP govt officials to set school bag weight limit

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) has summoned top officials of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government in a writ petition to legislate to set school bag weight limit for children. A division bench comprising Justice Qaiser Rashid Khan and Justice Muhammad Ibrahim Khan summoned the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chief secretary, secretary Elementary and Secondary Education, secretary Higher Education and chairman Text Book Board.

The court directed the officials to explain their position about the matter. During the course of the hearing, Justice Qaiser Rashid observed that the performance of the Education Department KP was unsatisfactory.

“Due to heavy school bags the children seem to be going for military training,” the senior judge observed. The deputy secretary Elementary and Secondary Education appeared in the court and submitted that the provincial government has started work on this issue and would submit a complete report before the court within two weeks. The court remarked that the government woke up after the court’s notice otherwise the issue would have gone unnoticed.

A Peshawar-based lawyer, Moammar Jalal, had filed the writ petition and requested the bench to direct the respondents to legislate or adopt a law to set the schoolbag weight limit as per the age of the children.

It was stated in the petition that children had to carry 2kg to 15kg heavy bags which could cause various types of health issues. The lawyer said the deputy medical superintendent of the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital in Karachi had written a letter to some school principals stating that heavy bags could cause neck, back and shoulder pain in children. The petitioner also produced a copy of the letter before the court along with various research studies to support his arguments.

The lawyer requested the court to direct the government to ensure that the weight of schoolbags should not be more than 10 per cent of the child’s body weight. He contended that it was unrealistic to expect students of kindergarten, first and second grades to carry heavy bags. The lawyer added India and Sri Lanka have formulated laws to set the weight limit of the schoolbags in 2006 and 2011 respectively. The lawyer said that Pakistan has not drafted any law and the children were forced to carry heavy bags.