All arrangements have been finalised to observe the first death anniversary of the martyrs of Army Public School (APS) Peshawar today (Wednesday) with great respect and to express solidarity with the bereaved families.
The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government has announced a public holiday on the occasion in Peshawar to express solidarity with the martyrs’ families.
The day will dawn with special prayers to be offered at mosques for peace, progress and prosperity in the country and eternal peace for the martyred students and teachers.
Special prayers will also be offered besides offering Quran Khwanis in all districts of KP.
The main event will be held at APS Peshawar in the morning where political leadership and military officials besides students and parents of deceased students will pay tributes to the victims for their sacrifices.
The KP government has chalked out comprehensive programmes in connection with the day to give a strong message to terrorists that the whole nation stands united to wipe them out from the country.
The mainstream political leadership will attend the death anniversary function at APS where a Martyrs’ Monument has been constructed and will be inaugurated on the occasion.
On the day, the Public and Archives’ Library at Peshawar Museum will be named after APS martyrs in a special ceremony that will be attended by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) Chief Imran Khan.
The PTI chief will also lead a peace march from Chief Minister’s Secretariat to Peshawar Municipal Library after attending the anniversary function.
KP government has already named 122 government schools and three roads after the APS victims, while five schools in FATA, two in Punjab and one in Balochistan have also been renamed after APS martyrs.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif also approved renaming of 122 colleges and schools of Islamabad after Shaheed students of APS to remember their sacrifices forever.
Apart from it, the federal government has announced Tamgha-e-Shujaat for 142 deceased and Sitara-e-Shujaat for two.
A psycho-social rehabilitation centre was established for the parents of all terrorism-affected APS students at the Combined Military Hospital Peshawar, where therapies were provided.
The affected families were offered Umrah packages, while students, teachers and their guardians visited friendly countries, including the US, China, Turkey and Oman as part of rehabilitation measures.
The package for the affected families included jobs for next of kin of attack victims, free education for one sibling, admission for injured students in cadet colleges and payment of Rs 2 million for bereaved families.
Under the package, as many as 91 injured students were admitted at different Cadet Colleges of the country and the province.
The provincial government has given Rs 338 million to the heirs of the deceased while the federal government provided Rs 86.8 million along with national awards.
Special Assistant to the Chief Minister on Information and spokesman of KP Government, Mushtaq Ghani told media the other day that as many as 855 family members of 142 martyrs were sent for Umrah.
APS incident was a national tragedy of that claimed a total of 151 lives including 144 students of APS.
