Barred windows, shoddy building standards and the flouting of basic safety regulations are being blamed for the worst fire tragedy in the country’s history that has so far claimed 314 lives in the country’s financial capital Karachi.
The fire started on Tuesday evening, when as many as 500 people were working at Ali Enterprises, a garments factory that mostly exports its products to foreign countries.
The fire raged for more than 15 hours before firefighters managed to bring it under control. For much of Wednesday, flames continued to smolder as rescue workers carried out body after body covered in white sheets.
As TV screens flashed images of mourning and wailing family members looking for their loved ones, people watching the developments at home across the country were equally aggrieved.
There seemed to be no end to the climbing tally, a 100, 200, 225… and many were left wondering where the official machinery was all this while, why was a fire allowed to wreak so much havoc and did those responsible for handling such emergencies only slept through the night as the blaze swallowed poor workers one by one?
Several questions are being raised over the ability of the government to provide safety to the people, over the efficiency of the country’s firefighting units, about the efficacy of building control authorities, the level of implementation of laws that they can ensure, why illegal industrial units are allowed to operate in residential areas, why are such units beyond adherence to safety procedures and who is to blame for the deaths of so many people who were merely trying to earn their bread.
Survivors told tales of frantically leaping from windows to escape the flames, as their colleagues were left trapped behind barred windows and locked doors.
Muhammad Ilyas, speaking from hospital, said he was working with about 50 other men and women when suddenly a fireball came from the staircase.
“I jumped from my seat as did others and rushed toward the windows, but iron bars on the windows barred us from escaping. Some of us quickly took tools and machines to break the iron bars,” he said. “That was how we managed to jump out of the windows down to the ground floor.”
Relatives gathered nearby to wait for news of loved ones as morgues filled with bodies so badly burned that they may never be identified. “The owners were more concerned with safeguarding the garments in the factory than the workers,” said Muhammad Pervez, an employee, holding up a photograph of his cousin, another worker who was missing.
“If there were no metal grilles on the windows a lot of people would have been saved. The factory was overflowing with garments and fabrics. Whoever complained was fired.”
Reports said the Ali Enterprises building had four exits but three were routinely kept locked to counter security threats as well as to keep out criminals.
Sources claimed that the factory owner had recently been asked to pay Rs 10 million as extortion, but he was only willing to pay a million rupees. However, SSP West Amir Farooqi told Pakistan Today that the police had not received any complaint from the owners of Ali Enterprises about any extortion calls although several factories in the area had been targeted by Karachi’s notorious Bhatta mafia. Some reports said a small fire had erupted on Tuesday afternoon, but the factory manager had asked the workers to put it out and locked the main gate to prevent them from leaving. However, the fire got out of hand and the workers got trapped inside.
Experts on the other hand said that per the Electrical Rules 1973, it was mandatory for every factory administration to regularly get its electronic appliances and other such equipment verified from the department concerned. They said the administration even had to get permission from the government’s electrical department before they could implant electrical devices and generators in their factories.
But the system was derailed in 2003 when an industrialist complained to then president Pervez Musharraf about electrical inspectors’ involvement in corruption.
Musharraf then purportedly ordered authorities to bar the inspectors from performing their duty. Since the last 9 years, zero monitoring or checking of electrical devices has been exercised in industrial sectors of Punjab and Sindh, causing frequent tragedies. On Wednesday, the Sindh government tasked Justice (r) Zahid Qurban Alvi with probing into the incident and an inquiry officer will submit the findings within a week.
A case No. 243/12 in SITE B Police Station under Sections 302, 307 and 306 of the PPC was registered against the owners of the garments factory – Shahid Bela, Arshad Bela and Ali Bela – and their names have been placed on the Exit Control List. None of the nominated accused have been arrested.
However, Shahid Bela told a private TV channel on the phone that he was very sorry for the unfortunate incident and was ready to compensate the victims’ families as per the law.
According to Sindh Health Minister Dr Sagheer Ahmed, 95 bodies were received at the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital, 80 at Civil Hospital Karachi and 71 at Jinnah Hospital.
While authorities name one reason or the other for the blaze, enraged labor leaders and trade unionists condemned the fire incidents in Karachi and Lahore and demanded a judicial inquiry into the tragedy. Following a protest demonstration, representatives of Pakistan Institute of Labor Education and Research (PILER) and National Trade Union Federation of Pakistan (NTUFP) slammed the rulers in a press conference at the Karachi Press Club.
Mushtaq Ali Shan of the NTUFP demanded that all factories be registered under the Factory Act and all factories operating in residential areas should be moved to industrial areas.
Karachi Commissioner Roshan Ali Skeikh said the investigation would be completed in three days, although he feared the toll rising further.
Karachi Fire Chief Ehtesham Salim accepted that the force was inadequately equipped, but said it tried to do all it could. “It [factory] was packed like a box with little room left for ventilation. There were no emergency exits,” he said. “We found people who died of suffocation caused by the highly toxic smoke. They died first and their bodies were burned by the raging fire later.”
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