In August 2023, Pakistan submitted its consolidated sixth and seventh periodic reports to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) committee for examination of its progress on the implementation of the convention in the country. The sixth and seventh periodic reports were originally due in 2016 and 2021 respectively. Since these reports were not submitted in time to the committee, the government submitted the two reports in a combined form. The next step would be the evaluation of the progress of Pakistan pertaining to the fulfillment, protection, and implementation of children's rights based on the report submitted by the state, including alternative reports submitted by UN agencies/organs (UNICEF, etc), National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs), civil society, etc.
In 2016, the UNCRC committee had examined Pakistan's fifth periodic report and issued a set of recommendations in its concluding observations about the implementation of the convention in the country by addressing the number of child protection thematic areas. With respect to legislation on child protection thematic areas, the committee observed that despite the its past recommendations made in its concluding observations of 2009, Pakistan had not taken sufficient steps to harmonise its legislative framework with the convention. The committee, therefore, recommended that Pakistan adopt all pending bills in the area of children’s rights and ensure that they conform with the convention. It also recommended that Pakistan should take measures to harmonise its legislation and regulations with the principles and provisions of the Convention in all areas affecting children, at the federal, provincial, and territorial levels.
To address the committee’s recommendations in its concluding observations about legislation in the fifth Periodic Report of Pakistan, Islamabad has tried hard to fulfill those recommendations in the country. In the last decade, Pakistan has made outstanding progress about the formulation, enactment, and implementation of policies, programmes, campaigns, and legislations on various child protection thematic areas, harmonisation of domestic legislations with the international standards particularly UNCRC, and establishment of child rights monitoring/protection bodies including ratification of various international conventions/protocols concerning children.
Some child protection thematic areas still require the attention of legislators to bring them in conformity with international standards, these are child marriages and labour issues
There were several notable child-protection thematic areas where model policies, programmes, campaigns, administrative actions, and legislations were executed by the federal, provincial, and territorial governments in the past decade. Some of the areas were policies or legislation were enacted included children in conflict with the law; raising the age of criminal responsibility to 14 years; child trafficking/smuggling; child sexual exploitation/abuse/harassment; rape; child pornography; online harassment/exploitation/violence of children; gender-based violence; corporal punishment; cruelty on children; torture and custodial deaths of children; missing children; street children; children with disabilities; child mortality; child malnutrition and stunted growth; honour killing; child marriages; child labour; birth registration; children education and health issues including establishment of child rights monitoring/protection institutions.
Some child protection thematic areas that still require attention from legislators to bring them in conformity with international standards include child marriages and labour issues. Each province/administrative territory list the age for marriage as less than 18 years, except Sindh, where the marriageable age for boys and girls, is 18 years. Similarly, the age for a child to be involved in labour is also different in every province/administrative territory. A child as young as 12-years-old can be exploited in light labour in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province. In other provinces/administrative territories, the minimum age set for children to be involved in labour is 14 or 15 years. By setting the age limit at lower than 18 years for the solemnisation of marriage and involvement in labour, makes children vulnerable to committing abuses, neglect, and exploitation with them.
In some child protection thematic areas, model legislation was enacted by only a few provinces/administrative territories and the remaining provinces/territories have yet to enact the legislation on the issue. For example, exclusive legislation on the prohibition of corporal punishment upon children was enacted by Sindh, the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT), and Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) only, whereas other provinces/administrative territories haven’t enacted exclusive legislation on it. Similarly, exclusive legislation to ban child labour at brick kilns was enacted by Punjab and Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJ&K) only, whereas other provinces/administrative territories haven’t enacted exclusive legislation on it.
In some child protection thematic areas, model legislation was enacted by the federal/provincial/territorial governments but their full implementation is still missing. For Example, JJSA 2018 was enacted by the federal government an it was applicable in all provinces barring GB and AJ&K. However, all provinces — except for KP — have not enacted the rules of this law to date for its full implementation. Likewise, the Anti-Rape (Investigation and Trial) Act 2021 enacted by the federal government, applicable across Pakistan, was partially implemented because enacting its rules for a subset of domains that it covers and does not reconcile its rules with other laws. Another important law, the Children’s Right to Free and Compulsory Education Act, was enacted by all provinces and territories, including GB, but its rules haven’t been enacted so far by any province/administrative territory — except for Sindh — for its implementation.
Notable child protection/monitoring bodies established by the federal/provincial government are the National Commission on the Rights of Child, the Balochistan Child Protection Commission, and the Child Protection Unit in Quetta. Likewise, notable conventions/protocols concerning children ratified/acceded by Pakistan are the Optional Protocol to the UNCRC on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (OPAC) ratified in 2016 and the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children Supplementing the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organised Crime (UNTIP Protocol) acceded in 2022.
Recommendations
- Uniform definition of child: There should be uniform legislation on child protection in thematic areas all over Pakistan. The laws that define the child below the age of 18 years must be amended to bring them in conformity with the UNCRC. This specifically applies to child marriages and labour scenarios.
- Enactment of rules: Those child protection laws whose rules have not been enacted so far must be enacted immediately for their full implementation in the country.
- Overriding effect of child protection laws: Exclusive legislation on child protection thematic areas should be given over-riding effect over other laws. This inter alia applies to PTIPA 2018. For example, in child trafficking offenses, certain sections of PPC 1860 and child labour laws overlap with the offense of trafficking under PTIPA 2018. Different laws prescribe different punishments for the trafficking offense, so it gives LEAs wide-ranged powers to choose a law under which to register a case and select of forum at which the case would be tried. Moreover, these loopholes in laws result in the form of acquittal of perpetrators or not receiving harsh punishments in child rights violation cases.
- Allocation of resources: The federal/provincial/territorial govt. Must allocate sufficient resources in the form of funding, staff, offices, equipment, etc. for the full implementation of child protection laws in the country.