Childhood Lost to Dung

Asem Mustafa Awan

Islamabad: Two young girls press dung cakes onto the walls of a home. Their bare hands move with precision, hardened not by skill but by necessity.

Around them, the air carries the pungent weight of what passes for fuel in the forgotten fringes of Pakistan. There is no innocence here only labour, resignation, and the unspoken truth that their childhood was exchanged for survival.

This is not rural nostalgia. This is policy failure made visible.

While governments boast of development, foreign aid, and digitization, entire generations remain locked in medieval livelihoods. These girls are not symbols of resilience they are victims of systemic neglect, trapped in cycles of poverty so deep that cow dung becomes the currency of life.

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They work in silence, their labour unnoticed by the very state that promised free education, clean energy, and safety for children. What’s most damning is that scenes like this are neither new nor rare. Across Sindh and southern Punjab, from the deserts of Thar to the outskirts of Quetta, the same tableau repeats: children replacing classrooms with cow pens, and playgrounds with brick walls layered in excrement.

Pakistan’s ruling elite has grown numb to such sights. Years of unchecked corruption, feudal appeasement, and ghost school scams have hollowed out any pretense of progress. Education budgets are pocketed, energy projects mismanaged, and clean fuel initiatives shelved — all while girls like these bake dung in blistering heat so their families can cook a single meal.

This is not the story of an isolated village. It’s the unfiltered truth of a nation’s failure a snapshot of policy’s absence and humanity’s neglect. Every dung cake on that wall is a rebuke to empty speeches, donor-funded reports, and five-year plans that never reach the ground.

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The state will call them resilient. It will say their tradition is beautiful. But tradition should not be a substitute for infrastructure. Culture should not mask deprivation. And no child should have to spend her formative years drying dung in the shadows of rotting bricks.

In this picture, there are no smiles only survival

And if the policymakers had any conscience left, they would see it too not in air-conditioned meetings or foreign tours, but here, on the walls, where the poorest children of Pakistan are forced to fuel their homes with filth, while those who rule them burn millions in privilege.

The article is the writer’s opinion, it may or may not adhere to the organization’s editorial policy.

Asem Mustafa Awan has extensive reporting experience with leading national and international media organizations. He has also contributed to reference books such as the Alpine Journal and the American Alpine Journal, among other international publications.