The Baldia factory fire in which 258 labourers lost their lives in 2012 is a case that has taken on another shocking dimension. A report released by the Rangers Joint Investigation Team (JIT) to the Sindh High Court has alleged that the factory was set on fire on purpose by MQM workers because the owner of the factory refused to pay bhatta (extortion) money to the party. These are the kind of charges that can cause immense damage to Altaf Hussain’s party; the intentional murder of 258 people by a mainstream political party is not something that can easily be swallowed, even by the most hardened of nations. The MQM has, expectedly, denied these claims going as far as to say that the accused ‘worker’ who has been named in the report is not actually an MQM worker and that he should be hanged in public if found to be behind the atrocity. So, not only is the MQM distancing itself from these flammable accusations, it is also disowning the main culprit.
To make matters worse, the MQM chief is now also in the eye of the PTI storm. Altaf Hussain apparently issued some very derogatory remarks recently against female PTI party workers, inciting the wrath of Imran Khan. Khan, in a press conference yesterday, lashed out at Altaf Hussain, calling him a “psychopath” and a “coward” and urging the MQM to distance itself from the party chief. He referred to the JIT report and urged the government to bring Altaf back to the country to be tried for the Baldia factory incident. There is no doubt about the fact that, in the wake of the damning report, a war of words has been unleashed between the PTI and the MQM with slurs and dirt being flung from one press conference to another.
What needs to be done is the exact opposite. The release of the JIT report calls for proper proceedings not the playing out of politics over the charred remains of the Baldia factory victims, poor men and women who were trying to eke out a living in the harshest conditions possible. They worked day and night in that factory to earn a pittance only to be burned alive in what could possibly be a politically/criminally motivated crime. What the MQM should do (or be made to do) is take its grievance to court. It has every right to defend itself but it does not seem appropriate to make the media one’s courtroom. If the MQM believes it is being unnecessarily associated with the tragedy of Baldia, it needs to prove the charge is not true in a court of law. It is the job of the state to bring some sort of closure to the families of the 258 deceased. The MQM is not wholly innocent when it comes to allegations of extortion. There is plenty of circumstantial evidence against it, pointing to a long and rather indisputable track record of protection money racketeering.
We owe it to the poor workers of Baldia to fully and completely investigate these claims. We cannot allow the accusations of the JIT report to be played out on our television screens with no proper recourse to a court of law. This is what usually happens in Pakistan: much hot air initially that is only deflated when news becomes too old to care for. But we must care for those 258 people — a staggering number — who perished in the flames in Baldia. Political rivalry and point scoring should not be the last remaining memories of those victims. The MQM needs to prove its innocence and the PTI needs to let that happen in the proper, judicial manner.
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