Samra Bibi had forgotten to bring a pencil to school on Thursday. She said she left her classroom that morning to get one from the canteen on the ground floor. Moments later, the school’s roof collapsed.
The small errand saved her life.
The disaster at her school, Al-Khair Education System, in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar, killed 32 children and a teacher.
Samra, 11, escaped without injury, but she could not sleep that night, her father, Muhammad Zameen, said on Friday. She clung to her parents, frightened by what she had witnessed and grieving her teacher, who had died in the collapse.
“All night she was hugging either her mother or me,” Mr. Zameen said, standing with Samra outside the school on Friday. “She is so upset and missing her teacher.”
According Fazal Wahab, a rescue worker who was at the site of the collapse on Friday, children were in class on different floors of the three-story building when sections of the roof gave way, sending debris crashing into the classrooms below. Dozens of other children were injured.
On Friday, Ismail Khan, whose 6-year-old daughter died in the collapse, received guests outside his house, a day after her funeral. People sat on chairs, offering prayers. The atmosphere was somber.
“We had breakfast together, then she left for school and we said goodbye. At 8:30 a.m., I received the news of roof collapse,” he said.
By Friday, the rescue operation had ended, but the narrow street outside the school in Dir Colony — where multistory buildings are pressed close together — was crowded with people. Men and children milled about, some staring at the damaged building, others worrying that what remained of it might also collapse.
For many residents, the disaster was not merely an accident but another example of a system in which negligence too often goes unpunished. “Our country is on a downhill slide,” said Noor Wali, whose son was a student at the school but was not injured. “Nothing is going right. Will anyone ever be held accountable?”
Across Pakistan, inexpensive private schools have proliferated as the public education system struggles to accommodate a growing population of children. For working-class families, such institutions often provide an accessible alternative, although oversight of their facilities can be inconsistent.
After Thursday’s collapse, more questions have emerged about their regulation.
Al-Khair, which offers regular classes during the day and religious instruction in the evenings, was only registered as a school in March, according to Asif Sharif, a police officer who was at the site on Friday.
According to Afaq Wazir, the deputy commissioner of Peshawar, the circumstances of the school’s construction, and whether it had undergone adequate safety inspections, are now central questions in the investigation by the provincial government.
Local police are investigating the collapse as a case of “death caused unintentionally” and have arrested the school’s principal.
Mr. Zameen said the principal had ignored pleas by parents to improve the building’s safety. “My wife is illiterate but even she said it three times that the building does not seem safe.”
The tragedy has also presented an early test for Pakistan’s government, which last week placed the province, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, under federal control. The move followed growing confrontations between the federal government and an opposition party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, led by the imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan, which has governed the province. Tensions escalated after the party organized protests calling for Mr. Khan’s release.
Under the emergency arrangement, Faisal Karim Kundi, the governor of the province, whose office’s powers are largely ceremonial, has assumed greater authority. A newly appointed council is helping to administer the province, which faces intense pressure to improve security. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which borders Afghanistan, has seen a surge in militant violence since the Taliban returned to power in 2021.
Mr. Kundi visited Dir Colony on Friday to offer condolences to bereaved families. “We will make sure there is accountability,” he said, adding that a report on the investigation would be presented to him within a week.
The governor has also called for safety inspections of public and private schools across the province. Afaq Wazir, the deputy commissioner, visited Al-Khair on Friday and said officials were surveying all old buildings to determine whether they were safe.
The education department of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa also ordered inspections of government school buildings, with district authorities instructed to submit reports by Oct. 26.
Samar Haroon Bilour, a spokeswoman for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government, issued a video message on Friday appealing for public cooperation in identifying dilapidated school buildings in the province.
For Peshawar, a city that has endured decades of violence by armed groups, the deaths stirred painful memories of another school tragedy. In December 2014, Taliban gunmen attacked the Army Public School, killing more than 140 people, most of them children.
“This tragedy is no less,” said Fazal Wahab, the rescue worker.
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