LAHORE: A team of social and psychological experts of Punjab University visited Kasur on Monday to assess the currents situation, effect of the incident on children and possible intervention to deal with the issue of child abuse. The team, consisting of Muhammad Arshad Abbasi, Aaliya Khalid, Saadia Shoaib and a number of students visited various schools and colleges to create awareness against child abuse and collected data. The team also called upon Chief Executive Officer Education, Deputy Commission Kasur and Deputy District Officer Social Welfare to discuss awareness campaign against child abuse. The team also visited various colleges and schools in Kasur where counseling and awareness sessions were conducted with the students. Various strategies were shared with the students to enable them to protect themselves against any kind of abuse. Professor Arshad Abbasi, who is also a renowned child rights activist, conducted sessions with the children to educate them about their rights. While addressing on occasion Dr Arshad Abbasi said that PU besides its leading role in higher education, playing a significant role in addressing different natural and social catastrophes in the country. He said that on the instructions of Vice Chancellor PU Dr Zakaria Zaki, PU has extended its collaboration with the line departments, civil society organizations and local communities to deal with the present situation caused by Zainab’s murder in District Kasur. Meanwhile, while addressing a meeting for brainstorming on role of academia in raising awareness against child abuse, Punjab Higher Education Commission’s Chairman Dr Nizamuddin said that our social problems could not be resolved and Kasur like incidents could not be prevented unless we do scientific research on social issues. The meetings was organised by PU at Al Raazi Hall convened by PU Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Zakria Zakir Addressing the meeting, Dr Nizamuddin said that we must do research on socio-cultural issues using scientific method in an objective way for better understanding of human rights. He said that we must know about real issues and existing situations through research. However, there are different taboos in our society and we could not openly discuss various topics. He said that such barriers should be removed from our society. He said that the concept of human rights had actually come from the speech of Hazrat Muhammad (SAW) on the occasion of ‘Hijatulwida, not from the West. “We need to understand family values and give training to our parents, teachers and students in order to cope with such incidents. We need to define extremism and we must point out reasons behind it. PHEC will provide funding for such research projects,” he said. PU Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Zakria Zakir said that Kasur like incidents were happening in all the countries of the world and this was a global issue. He said that PU would conduct multi-disciplinary research on this issue since it was matter of our survival. He said that PU, after conducting scientific research, would provide policy guidelines to the government and would play its role to sensitize civil society and media in this regard. He said that there was need to promote linkages between societies and universities and PU would play lead role in resolving such issues. He said that PU administration had also sent a team of social and psychological experts to Kasur for scientific investigations and creating awareness. Later, various heads of departments presented their proposals to resolve such issues. Published in Daily Times, January 16th 2018.