One such place is the Data Darbar Shrine where children, notably boys aged between eight and 15, sleep on torn beddings without safety and comfort a home. They live of the shrine's huge langar (free kitchen).
SCALE OF PROBLEM
The true scale of the problem is unknown, since there is not a single working organization in Pakistan with the accurate number or figure of the runaway children. To give a lose view an organization working with the street children is reported to have said that at least 5000 runaway children sweep the city streets at any one time.
According to an estimation made by a charitable organization by the name Edhi Foundation, that has devoted homes for runaway children and programs to unite them with their parents there are at least 10,000 such children in Karachi alone. This number is constantly increasing, mainly due to domestic violence or acute socio-economic hardship which children refuse to bear. Other sources suggest there are more than a million runaway children across the country. Most earn their living from selling the empty bottles, cans and paper they collect each day through garbage and rubbish littered on the streets and dumping places.
SURVIVING ON THE STREETS
Some beg, some offer sex, some massage as an alternate earning up to 500 rupees
for an hour or so with a man to provide themselves with food and hopefully shelter. Such cruel and undignified practices are conveniently present in places like minar-e-pakistan, data darbar and railway station. More and more children are then drawn to petty crimes of pick-pocketing, drug selling to become professional criminals.
HEALTH RISKS
Many of the children suffer deep psychological problems, sometimes they harm themselves through different means, for instance by cutting themselves with razors. Skin disorders, sexually transmitted diseases and other problems arise from glue addiction. Most of the street children in the city inhale Samad Bond, which is a common commercial adhesive that comes cheap and easy, it also damages body organs it used over prolonged periods.
“The child has right to express his or her opinion freely and to have that opinion taken into account in any matter or procedure affecting the child”
article12CRE.Runaway children in Pakistan experience many forms of violence and exploitation by society and the state. At a great extent we/people are responsible for their rude attitude towards us because whenever we came across these children we just pass away without knowing the difficulties they are facing and whenever they need help we just ignore them.
We can’t even think to place our children in such kind of atmosphere in which runaway children are living, and facing problems. As they are innocent children and need help and support of people like us but we don’t bother to do so thus we have to admit the fact that the behavior of people towards runaway children is not acceptable. Although there is a sympathetically consideration by the society, and NGO’s towards these children but it has also been observed that if negative response has been delivered by the NGOs and society can create a bad impact on the personalities of these kinds of children. Children are sensitive; they need friendly atmosphere, and if we are friendly to them then this will change their attitude towards positive aspect and will show a great change in their aggressive behavior as they only need love, support, and comfort. Media has created awareness among people about
It’s a duty of each individual to adopt athis cause. Media provide opportunity to humanizing child and do efforts to protect the rights of child. As well as society has played a vital role for the welfare of these runaway children through NGO and other organization children are able to recognize themselves there is hope of their betterment. “For all form of exploitation, street children were on the most vulnerable group” said by NAZRA JAHAN of SPARC. She added that these children are at high risk of sex related diseases like HIV and AIDS.
measures to strengthen their position and secondly it’s the responsibility of society to take part in the activities like facilitate NGO’S and shake hand with the government to provide the right path for the children who intend to run away. Basically it’s a Government duty to provide good atmosphere to these children in order to remain them in their houses. Government can provide them with the basic rights like food shelter; jobs, education and other co-curricular activities in order to bring changes in their lives.
Mostly children run away from their houses due to different factors like negligence, physical abuse, without knowing the problems they have to face after running.This thing can be best explained by the word ‘corporal’ punishment. It is the use of physical punishment or force to correct a child’s behavior. Other definition of this term can also include mental abuse, physical abuse or humiliation intended as discipline. This issue is quite common in our country and regularly practiced in the Schools, Madrassass and homes, which is the major reason for a child for a child to runaway. Abuse and violence in school may include exploitation by peers or teachers, bullying, sexual abuse and harassment.
Thousands of children, mostly runaways, roam the streets of Pakistan’s major cities to earn a living, preferring the streets to their homes. Many children run away because of the following reasons:- Constant quarrels of parents, causing severe insecurity in the child.
- If they feel unloved.
- Sibling rivalry or arrival of a new child.
- Fear of physical danger like the father beating them for a certain wrongdoing.
- Fear that there will be withdrawal of emotional support for wrong doings.
- Failure or decline in the examination or test paper.
- If prone to impulsiveness.
- To accompany a friend in distress.
- Many children run because they run to a better life and many feels if they don’t run, they might end up found in severe situation.
Many children are the victims of abuse, whether it can be verbal, scolding slapping, shouting, twisting ears, insulting, beating by their parents, step parents, older sibling, also can be by other relatives. This situation effects the child development whether it can be mentally, emotionally, socially or behaviorally.Mostly school dropouts belong to poor families and end up on streets where they are exposed to all types of abuse and exploitations.
These children are not carter or treated well. There are often treated or dismissed as “druggies”, “Aids infected” or “prostitutes” etc
This is the most vulnerable group to Child Sexual Abuse. They are forcefully involved in it by the organized crime network, and latter it becomes a means of survival in the streets. Their erratic existence some times produces distortion of the mind in the younger children who lose track of time, and distance, they do not know how long they are wandering.
Runaway of children is a complex and hidden phenomena in Pakistan, requires innovative and evidence based responses it is clear from this study that there is an urgent need for holistic and child-centered implies that a program m fully respects all element of the child. Things that can be done: - Addressing the root causes of children leaving their houses at a younger age,
- Challenging the existing socio-culture norms and practices,
- Recognizing street/runaway children as rights holders and social actors,
- More in depth research was needed on various manifestations of runaways including trafficking etc,
- The results should be used for advocacy lobbying and for designing child protection programs in the frame world of Nation plan of action against causes of this problem,
- Educate the community so it can recognize children who may be at risk for exploitation, recognize exploitation and their tricks, and be aware of the strategies and actions for intervention,
- Children’s clubs and child centered and media may be important tools for sensitizing children peer support programs and peer to peer drama may be interest methods to strengthen child participation and ownership of children,
- The media in its multiple forms should educate the public and make aware nesses to eliminate the stereotypes surroundings for runaway children and youth.
Studies suggests that communities should be involved in the re integration process of the victims from the beginning. This may avoid stigmatization and may facilitative
re integration of the victims, also awareness and education on life skills (assertion skills etc) will help in the prevention of abuse and exploitation and the development of protection behavior in children. While integrating personal health, protection and integration should be included into the formal school curriculum.
Law makers should implement education programs for at risk children so they can recognize and be aware of appropriate ways to protect themselves from abusive behavior and to promote their impersonal communicational skills, critical thinking, confidence and self esteem. It will lead to heightening of their awareness and lessen their risks of becoming victims of runaways.
Pehchaan & SPARC are working for the rights of children & helping them find their identity. Perhaps the most disadvantaged group in Pakistan is the millions of street c
children who live or work on the street. Street children fall through the cracks in the society – there are few opportunities and ladders for them to climb back and return to normal life.
Children live and work on the street because their parents are poor, they are orphans, or they are abused at home. They are invariably mal-nourished, receive minimal education or medical treatment, and are involved in child labor from an early age. Child prostitution and sexual abuse are also major problems, as is addiction to drugs. These children live in a world different than ours. Taken as a separate nation, they are the most suffering people on our planet.
The root causes leading to these children’s plight are beyond a single NGO’s power to change, but PAHCHAAN & SPARC believes in helping where it can. To such children we are striving to provide:
- Repatriation to Their Families
- Temporary Shelters
- Street Schools
- Vocational Training
- Nutrition
- Medical Treatment
- Shower Facilities
- AIDS Awareness; and
- A Help Line for Children
Pahchaan (Protection And Help of Children Against Abuse and Neglect) is a Lahore-based non-government, non-profit, registered organization working on child protection issues. 
Pahchaan’s focus is on street children, runaway children, and other children in difficult circumstances, especially those vulnerable to abuse and exploitation. It also aims to work with service providers and parents/caregivers through increased awareness, networking, and capacity building in order to create a more protective environment for the children under their care. The NGO'S also said it was planning to open a drop in centre for such children with the help of international sponsors including the European Commission and Group Development and the organization End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes (ECPAT).
in late 1999, after a psychopath, Javed Iqbal, wrote in to national newspapers claiming he had murdered 100 street children, and then dissolved their bodies in acid. Though the deaths were never proven, the recognition by the victim's families of their clothing, carefully preserved by Iqbal, and the failure of any of the boys, all photographed by Iqbal before their deaths, to turn up, suggest the claims of the man who became known as the country's most notorious serial killer, may well have been accurate. Javed committed suicide in mysterious circumstances at Lahore's Kot Lakhpat Jail two years after handing himself in to police in 2000. His lawyers still maintain he was murdered by other convicts or jail staff.
The shocking revelations from Iqbal about his kidnapping and murder of
street children, led to many official pledges to set up shelters for
runaway children and booths where they could seek help. Efforts since then
to put such shelters in place have been minimal, and virtually none run
today in the public sector. The police too remain frequently reluctant to
register reports about missing children, or to play any part in seeking
them out.
However, in April this year the Punjab government set up the Bureau of
Child Protection and Welfare, an initiative supported by the United
Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). The Punjab chief minister's adviser on
children's rights, paediatrician Dr Faiza Asghar, has also said that laws
are being brought in to better protect children, and programmes for child
beggars and addicts devised. "A lot more needs to be done to protect
children who are deprived," she told IRIN.
UNICEF's Shamshad Bokhari explained to IRIN that "our work with the Child
Protection Bureau is a first step in the effort to tackle the runaway
children issue." He added that UNICEF was focusing on two main areas:
"awareness-raising about the problem and the capacity building of recovery
and reintegration staff, which will be working to rehabilitate children."
How far such efforts will succeed in resolving the issue of street
children remains to be seen. The problem is clearly a complex one, tied
into overwhelming poverty, unemployment, violence within homes and the
many social and economic frustrations families confront. The number of
children leaving home, some aged little more than seven or eight, is also
on the increase and it would appear that solutions can come only as part
of broader policies that address the root causes of children's desperation
and their increased suffering as a result of worsening socio-economic
conditions across the country.
titutions or unfair activities,.Ninety five percent of the street children in Pakistan inhale ‘Samad Bond’ , a common commercial adhesive that creates temporary felling of ‘euphoria’ as it is easily available and is cheap so every child can afford it that can cause ‘fatal organ damage’ and most of the children suffer from respiratory problem because of this addiction .Sometimes these runaways and homeless youth are force to exchange sex for shelter; food, clothing and other basic necessities, and this act increase their risk for HIV infection and other diseases.