Punjab Safe Cities Authority’s Mera Pyara Virtual Centre for Child Safety has reached Champion status at the World Summit on the Information Society Prizes 2026, organised under the United Nations by the International Telecommunication Union. The authority’s Virtual Women Police Station was separately shortlisted among the top 20 projects globally in its own category, giving Punjab two internationally recognised digital governance initiatives in the same award cycle.
The International Telecommunication Union listed Mera Pyara among five Champion level finalists in the E-Government category, a group that also included projects from the Netherlands, Sweden, Malawi, and Indonesia. Following an expert evaluation, Indonesia’s Rumah Pendidikan, an AI powered education access platform run by the country’s Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education, was selected as the category’s final Winner. Mera Pyara remained one of four other Champion projects that did not secure the top category award but were still recognised among the world’s leading digital government initiatives for the year. The WSIS Prizes 2026 received close to 1,600 submissions from more than 120 countries, with 360 projects shortlisted across 18 categories before public voting narrowed each category down to five Champion level finalists.
Mera Pyara was launched by Punjab Safe Cities Authority in July 2024 to help reunite missing children, senior citizens, and persons with disabilities with their families, operating around the clock in collaboration with Punjab Police, the Child Protection Bureau, and Edhi Homes. According to the WSIS report, the platform has handled more than 145,000 cases across various categories, with more than 136,000 successfully resolved, and has helped trace and reunite more than 77,000 missing children with their families, including around 3,000 children with special needs. The system relies on facial recognition, location matching, camera surveillance, field tracking, and social media monitoring to support its case resolution process, and is linked with the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, connecting Pakistan to a broader global child protection network.
Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz Sharif welcomed the recognition, saying it reflected international acknowledgment of technology driven public services and helped project a positive image of Pakistan globally. Punjab Safe Cities Authority Chief Operating Officer Mustansar Feroz represented Pakistan at the award ceremony in Geneva, receiving recognition for both projects on the authority’s behalf.
The Virtual Women Police Station, the second Punjab Safe Cities Authority initiative recognised at this year’s WSIS Prizes, allows women to report crimes, seek assistance, and access legal support without needing to visit a police station in person, addressing a barrier that has historically discouraged women, particularly in smaller cities and rural areas, from formally reporting incidents. With both projects earning recognition in the same award cycle, Punjab Safe Cities Authority becomes one of the few government bodies globally to place two separate initiatives among the WSIS Prizes’ shortlisted projects in a single year, reinforcing the authority’s growing profile in digital governance and technology driven public safety on the international stage.
Follow the SPIN IDG WhatsApp Channel for updates across the Smart Pakistan Insights Network covering all of Pakistan’s technology ecosystem.
