Toy gun fights dampen Eid sentiment in Quetta

Many children were reportedly treated for eye injuries

QUETTA: Despite a ban, toy guns were sold openly in Quetta during Eidul Fitr holidays. The auspicious occasion, which enlists burying old enmities and beginning new journeys as one of the compulsory good deeds, could not stop the elders from fighting over their children for shooting each other in the eyes with plastic pellets from their toy guns.

Reportedly, many children were treated for eye injuries at hospitals. However, there was no system put in place by the government to enforce the ban.

Before Eid, the people of the city had appealed to the government to punish the vendors of toy guns and impose heavy fines on the children using them.

According to details, the ban imposed on the sale of toy guns seemed to be a joke as they were being sold openly throughout the city.



Before the advent of Eid, a huge number of toy guns with plastic pellets were transported to the city. Children kept shooting each other with plastic pellets. Many children were reportedly injured over which fights also ensued between their elders.

The government had imposed a ban on toy pistols before Eid but no system could be seen in place to enforce the ban.

A five-year-old child, with no sense of what is good and what is bad, was seen shooting people with plastic pellets coming out of his toy gun every time he pressed the trigger. With Balochistan already on the hit list of terrorists, buying such a toy for children raises several serious questions about their grooming.

Apart from parents’ grooming, society also plays a vital role in children’s upbringing. The government initiates crackdown against poor pushcart owners, and for toy guns, it thinks that just imposing a ban would do the trick.



The people of the city have again appealed to the government to punish the vendors of toy guns and impose heavy fines on the parents of the children playing with such toys so that that this badness could be stopped before it spreads.