Baldia fire: JIT off to London to record factory owners’ statements

Police call forensic team from Punjab to help with investigations

KARACHI:

A team of police officials is likely to fly to London in a couple of days after the joint investigation team (JIT) tasked with the investigation of the Baldia Town factory fire case has been given permission to leave the country to carry out further investigation.

Karachi AIG Mushtaq Shah said that the police team will leave to record the statements of the factory owners, who are currently living in London and refuse to come back to the country. The factory owners went to London after the tragic factory fire three years ago that claimed the lives of over 250 people.

The four-member investigation team will be headed by DIG Munir Shaikh and DIG Sultan Khawaja. A senior official privy to the case told The Express Tribune that the statements of the factory owners had already been recorded after the incident occurred but new statements were required as the case took a dramatic turn when a report by the Rangers claimed that the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) was behind the deadly fire. The Rangers claimed that Rizwan Qureshi, a worker of the MQM, during interrogation revealed that the factory was set on fire by MQM workers over refusal to pay Rs200 million in extortion money, which the MQM has already denied.

Though three years have passed and more than three JITs have been formed, investigators have failed to ascertain whether it was an accidental fire or a criminal act.

Meanwhile, a team of forensic experts has reached Karachi from Punjab to help the officials in the investigation. The four-member forensic expert team will visit the Baldia factory to collect evidence and examine the factory. A police official who wished not to be named said that the team of forensic experts has been summoned to ascertain the cause of the fire and the team will submit the report to the Sindh Police.

The officer said that because the forensic division of the Sindh Police has no equipment that could help in ascertaining the nature of the fire, a team of forensic experts from Punjab was called.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 2^nd, 2015.