Gul Plaza judicial commission completes fire inquiry, report due to Sindh government on April 7

KARACHI: The judicial commission set up to investigate the Jan 17 fire at Gul Plaza Shopping Mall has completed its proceedings and will hand over its inquiry report to the Sindh government on April 7.

The single-member commission, headed by Sindh High Court Justice Agha Faisal, had begun its work in early February to examine the blaze that killed 73 people.

According to a letter sent on Thursday by the commission’s registrar, Iqbal Hassan Khatti, to the Sindh law secretary, the inquiry has been concluded and the report is ready for submission to the provincial government.

The letter said the commission had been constituted under Section 3 of the Sindh Tribunals of Inquiry Ordinance 1969 through a gazette notification issued on Feb 10. The body had been formed to examine the Gul Plaza fire in line with the terms of reference laid out in that notification, and that the time allowed for completing the inquiry was eight weeks.

It is hereby intimated that the commission has concluded the inquiry entrusted thereto and seeks to submit its inquiry report to the government. The report is accompanied by four additional volumes, comprising the entire record of the commission and upon which the report is rested,

In the same communication, the registrar asked the law secretary to come to the commission secretariat at the Sindh High Court on April 7 for the formal transfer of the report.

The report, along with the entire record, has been duly sealed and shall be entrusted to you in discharge of duty of this commission. It shall remain the prerogative of the Government of Sindh to determine whether the same is to be brought into the public domain; and if so then the timing thereof,

The commission’s findings, along with the complete record, will therefore first go to the provincial government, which will decide whether the report should be made public and when that should happen.

Background to the inquiry

The Sindh government had initially constituted a two-member inquiry committee made up of the Karachi commissioner and the city police chief. However, after opposition parties called for a judicial probe, the provincial administration set up the present judicial commission.

Besides identifying responsibility for the deadly incident, the commission was also assigned to review whether building approvals and lease extensions linked to Gul Plaza had been granted in accordance with applicable laws, rules and regulations.

That examination covered approvals and lease matters involving the Sindh Building Control Authority, its predecessor organisations, and the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation.

The Jan 17 fire at Gul Plaza Shopping Mall was one of the deadliest such incidents in Karachi in recent years, claiming 73 lives. The inquiry report, now complete, is expected to be formally submitted to the Sindh government on April 7 along with four additional volumes containing the full record compiled by the commission during its proceedings.