14 children die in Lahore tutoring centre roof collapse

A tutoring centre roof collapsed in Lahore on Tuesday, killing 14 children and injuring eight others, while rescuers pulled a 30-year-old female teacher from the rubble. The building gave way in Basti Eid Gah, in Kahna Nau on the edge of Pakistan’s eastern city, as workers were repairing tiles above the classroom.

Punjab emergency service teams and local rescuers dug through debris by hand and with shovels as families gathered outside hospitals and homes. Most of the dead children were younger than 9, and officials said the victims were children attending a private after-school centre that had been operating inside a residential building.

Punjab Information Minister Azma Bokhari said preliminary findings showed the tutoring centre was unregistered and located in a privately owned house with a dilapidated roof. Officials also said the structure was aging and that the unfinished second floor appeared to have collapsed because of poor construction quality. Police said the owner of the centre and another person were arrested as investigators examined the site.

The collapse has sharpened scrutiny of a sector that serves thousands of families across Lahore and Punjab, where parents commonly send children to private tutoring centres in the afternoon and evening. Provincial officials said they would survey unsafe buildings before the monsoon season and consider tighter rules for unregistered tutoring centres and other private educational facilities that operate outside the scrutiny applied to formal schools.

President Asif Ali Zardari expressed grief over the deaths and called for effective safety measures to prevent another disaster. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said the injured should receive every possible medical assistance. The response has turned quickly from rescue to enforcement, with officials under pressure to determine who approved the building, who maintained it, and whether warning signs were missed before the roof failed.

Building collapses remain a recurring hazard in Pakistan, where weak safety standards and substandard construction materials have repeatedly been cited after fatal accidents. A collapse in Karachi’s Lyari area in July 2025 killed 27 people and injured 10, a reminder that residential structures used for public activity can become deadly when inspections are absent and repairs are left to chance.