Youth in Pakistan

[8] Article 25-A of the Constitution of Pakistan obligates the state to provide free and compulsory quality education to children of the age group of 5 to 16 years.

"The State shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of five to sixteen years in such a manner as may be determined by law".

[17] Another custom in Pakistan, called swara or vani, involves village elders solving family disputes or settling unpaid debts by marrying off girls.

The law and order problem worsens their condition as boys and girls are fair game to others who would force them into stealing, scavenging, and smuggling to survive.

[25] Issues like domestic violence, unemployment, natural disasters, poverty, unequal industrialization, unplanned rapid urbanization, family disintegration, and lack of education are considered the major factors behind the increase in the number of street children.

Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Child (SPARC) carried out a study which presented 56.5% of the children interviewed in Multan, 82.2% in Karachi, 80.5% in Hyderabad, and 83.3% in Sukkur were forced to move on to the streets after the 2010 and 2011 floods.

[27] The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan estimated that in the 1990s, 11 million children were working in the country, half of whom were under age ten.

[28] Domestic violence leads to increased risk towards certain health outcomes like major depression, dysthymia, conduct disorder, and drug abuse.

[29] Moreover, because women are primary caretakers in Pakistan, children also face increased risk for depression and behavioural problems.

[31] National surveys show that for almost three decades, the rates of stunting and acute undernutrition in children under five years of age have remained stagnant, at 45% and 16%, respectively.

[32] Additionally, at the “national level almost 40% of these children are underweight...and about 9% [are affected] by wasting”, diseases where muscle and fat tissues degenerate as a result of malnutrition.

[47] In August 2015, the country launched an injectable polio vaccine intended to treat four million children and bring Pakistan closer to its goal of eradication by 2016.

[50] Widespread malnutrition in Pakistani children is a factor in lowered resistance to disabling diseases and reduced efficacy of the polio vaccine.

[53] The duration of disability of polio, averaged over 1000 people, was 81.84 years, the equivalent of diseases including diphtheria, childhood meningitis, and measles.