PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa elementary and secondary education department has relaxed the uniform restriction for schoolchildren to protect them from the cold wave that has swept the province for the last few days.

Low temperatures have been reported in most parts of the province due to biting cold and foggy conditions.

The education department has directed school heads to allow students to wear warm clothes other than uniforms in view of the “extreme cold weather conditions.”

“We are observing the present extremely cold weather prevailing throughout KP and making hurdles to the students’ teaching learning process,” read a notification issued by the department on Wednesday.

It added that some areas reported that the students were forced not to wear warm garments other than uniform.

“You are directed to issue directions to all heads of the institutions to grant relaxation in school uniform and allow the students to wear warm garments i.e. coat, sweater, cap etc irrespective of school uniform till the normal condition in weather,” it read.

The parents are worried about the health of their children going to school amid low visibility in the morning.

“I don’t know why the government is not taking seriously prevailing cold and foggy weather which is very harmful to the children of primary schools,” Ayaz Khan, who takes his six year-old-daughter to a private school in Peshawar daily, told Dawn.

He said if the government didn’t close primary schools, it should delay school opening time by an hour.

An official at the Met Office told Dawn that fog was likely to ease to a large extent after Sunday.

He forecast rains in most parts of the province for two to three days next week.

The principal of a private school told Dawn that student arrivals had dropped by 30 per cent due to extreme cold and fog.

He said the number of absent students was high in primary and pre-primary classes as parents didn’t send those minors to school due to the biting cold.

“Many students in the middle section who have a sibling in primary also skip classes along with minor family members.”

The principal said such students were not fined after relaxing rules.

Earlier this month, the provincial government extended winter vacation for two weeks citing extreme cold and dense fog in most of the summer zone as the reason.

After a break of a few days, dense fog and intense cold returned, causing problems for students, especially minors.

Published in Dawn, January 25th, 2024