THE recent collapse of a school building in Peshawar’s Dir Colony, which killed over 30 students and left many injured, should serve as a wake-up call for the authorities. Whether officials will finally take long-term action to prevent such tragedies is not known at the moment. True, the authorities are quick to take ‘remedial measures’ in the wake of a disaster, but the action hardly has the desired effect. The National Disaster Management Authority, alongside its provincial and district counterparts, was created after the 2005 earthquake in KP and Azad Kashmir. An Earthquake Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Authority was also created and later merged with the NDMA. However, in several instances, the NDMA has failed to live up to its mandate.

In the case of Peshawar, as in other Pakistani cities, various agencies have the mandate to regulate building practices in their jurisdictions. Development authorities, municipal corporations, provincial land-use and building-control authorities, and school monitoring regulators share responsibility. But tragedies like the recent school collapse still happen.

School managements must be advised to have their premises assessed for........

© Dawn