Peshawar School Roof Collapse Kills 28, Mostly Children, as Owner Is Arrested
A privately run school in Peshawar, the capital of Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, collapsed during morning classes on Thursday, October 15. Rescue officials and hospitals first reported four dead and 20 injured; as the search advanced the toll climbed to at least 27 students and one female teacher, and the Associated Press and NPR put the figure at 28 children plus a teacher, with more than 50 people hurt. Several outlets warned the death toll could rise further.
A local official told the BBC that the ceiling of a first-floor classroom gave way first, crashing onto the ground-floor classroom beneath it and causing part of the lower structure to collapse, burying students under concrete and brick. Mahwish Zaman, an injured teacher interviewed by the AP from her hospital bed, said she was in her classroom when it happened and "felt as if the sky had fallen"; she woke up in hospital.
Peshawar's Capital City Police chief, Mian Saeed, said the owner of the three-storey building had been arrested, describing the school as structurally weak and the roof as poorly built, and noting the institution operated under an education trust. Police pledged legal action over "negligence," and Saeed said investigators would establish which building regulations were violated and hold a proper inquiry into responsibility.
Lady Reading Hospital spokesman Mohammad Asim said all the deceased children were aged 13 or under, six of them girls, and that most victims were brought in dead, along with about 20 wounded, some in critical condition. District emergency officer Iftikhar Khan said rescuers had "taken out at least 45 children," with more reported buried in the rubble. Pakistani outlets including Daily Pakistan and ARY News said a second female teacher was also among the dead.
Citing Aaj News and rescue officials, Business Recorder reported that 40 of the injured were taken to Lady Reading Hospital and 10 to Nasirullah Babar Hospital. The city's police chief said the school stood in narrow streets that heavy machinery could not enter, so rescue workers cleared concrete slabs by hand and with light tools, aided by Pakistan Army personnel. Peshawar Deputy Commissioner Afaq Wazir later said the operation had concluded, all debris was cleared and no injured children remained at the scene.
Accounts of how many pupils were in the building conflict. The police chief said 110 children were enrolled and 30 students were in upstairs classrooms when the roof fell; the city superintendent of police said preliminary information indicated about 75 children had been in three classrooms; and injured teacher Zaman told the AP the three-storey school, which taught nursery through fifth grade, had roughly 1,200 students enrolled. Authorities said they were gathering records to establish the real enrolment figure, a gap that will matter in any reckoning over responsibility.
The provincial government said it had formed a committee to investigate the cause. In Islamabad, President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif issued separate statements mourning the dead and offering condolences; Zardari called for a comprehensive investigation and stressed that school buildings must meet safety standards. Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar said Sharif had taken "serious notice," adding that "our children are our most precious asset, and every such loss is a tragedy for the entire country." Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Faisal Karim Kundi requested a detailed report and urged hospitals to prioritise treatment.
Provincial Education Secretary Inayatullah Waseem has directed the managing director of the Private Schools Regulatory Authority to submit a report on the incident by Friday. The police chief said authorities would examine which building regulations were breached and pursue who was responsible for the negligence. Questions over how private school premises are inspected are mounting.
Private schools have multiplied fast across Pakistan's northwest, often occupying converted or extended residential buildings used as teaching space. This collapse stacked three familiar risks: a weak structure, poor construction and large numbers of very young students inside a three-storey house. Safety rules exist on paper; enforcement is the part that keeps failing, and that is what the inquiries must answer.
The next steps will tell the story: the findings of the provincial committee, the regulatory verdict due from the Private Schools Regulatory Authority on Friday, and whether a promised review of school buildings reaches institutions like this one, run under a trust and housed in a converted home. The rescue is over; the reckoning over who answers for 28 lives has barely started.