LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — A roof collapse at a tutoring center under construction in Pakistan’s eastern city of Lahore on Tuesday killed at least 14 schoolchildren, police and rescue officials said.
Eight other children were injured and being treated at a hospital, senior police official Faisal Kamran said, adding that the owner of the tutoring center and another person have been arrested.
Kamran said rescuers were searching through the rubble after receiving reports that more children could be trapped beneath the debris.
He said the tutoring center was housed in an aging building and that the roof of an unfinished second floor apparently collapsed because of poor construction quality.
Building collapses are common in Pakistan, where construction standards are often poorly enforced.
Many structures are built with substandard materials, and safety regulations are frequently ignored to reduce costs.
Witnesses said ambulances and rescue workers rushed to the scene after the roof collapsed.
Residents also joined the search, using shovels and their bare hands to remove rubble in an effort to reach children trapped beneath the debris.
Hours later, as the bodies of the children were being handed over to their families, scenes of anguish unfolded outside hospitals and in the neighborhood on the outskirts of Lahore where the private tutoring center was located in a house.
Parents wept over the loss of their children, while mothers and other female relatives cried and beat their chests in grief.
Most of the victims lived nearby, and funeral prayers were expected later Tuesday.
Grief was mixed with anger as residents demanded stern punishment for the owner of the tutoring center, blaming him for operating classes in what they described as an aging and unsafe building.
Dozens of mourners were seen gathering outside the victims’ homes to offer condolences.
“We don’t know whose home to visit first to offer condolences for the loss of their children,” resident Zafar Iqbal said as he moved from one bereaved family’s home to another nearby street.
Lahore is the capital of Pakistan’s most populous Punjab province, where many parents send their children to private tutoring centers in the afternoon and evening.
Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif expressed grief over the collapse of the roof of an evening school building in Lahore.
In separate statements, they offered condolences to the families of the victims, prayed for the speedy recovery of those injured, and said effective safety measures were needed to prevent similar tragedies.