11-year-old boy, 4 others accused in Karachi's Gul Plaza blaze granted interim bail

KARACHI: An additional district and sessions judge on Monday granted interim bail to five of the six accused in the deadly Gul Plaza blaze, including the building union president and an 11-year-old boy.

The deadly inferno, which erupted on the night of January 17 at the mall and took nearly two days to be fully extinguished, had claimed at least 73 lives and left over 1,100 shops in ruins.

In the charge sheet, six persons had been named as accused persons: 11-year-old Huzaifa; his father, Naimatullah who owned an artificial flower shop; and Gul Plaza Traders Association President Tanveer Pasta along with its members Ammar Ismail, Muhammad Ramzan, and Muhammad Ameen.

Naimatullah, Pasta, Ismail and Ramazan were granted bail against a surety bond of Rs500,000 each, their lawyer Shaikh Jawaid Mir said.

The child was granted interim bail against a surety worth Rs10,000.

A written order issued by Judge Muhammad Aslam Shaikh read: “The contention required consideration and at this stage without touching the merits of the case, the applicants/accused persons are admitted to pre-arrest interim bail.”

It directed the investigating officer (IO) to appear in person at the next hearing on July 14 with the police file.

The judge ordered the accused person to “cooperate with [the] investigation agency” and appear before the court at the next hearing.

In his arguments before the court, Advocate Mir defended the Gul Plaza management, saying their timely efforts saved “thousands of lives”.

He blamed the “mismanagement and criminal negligence” of the district administration, Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC), the Sindh Building Control Authority (SBCA), Civil Defence, the fire department and Rescue 1122.

The lawyer alleged that the IO was blaming the Gul Plaza management to “save” the aforementioned authorities.

Mir also denied the charges against Huzaifa, saying he was not running the shop but was merely present there. He accused the IO of “deliberately” concealing that Huzaifa’s brother Kamran, who was around 24 years old, was present in Gul Plaza in their father’s absence on the day.

The lawyer contended that Ameen, a management committee member named in the charge sheet, had moved to the United States six months before the incident and was not even present in Pakistan when the fire erupted.

He argued that bail could not be withheld as punishment.

The charge sheet

In the charge sheet filed before a court on Saturday, all the nominated persons were shown as absconders and the IO had listed 42 prosecution witnesses in the case.

According to the charge sheet, several prosecution witnesses had recorded their statements under Section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code before a judicial magistrate.

One of them, 13-year-old Aryan, deposed that he was present at his friend Huzaifa’s shop at Gul Plaza and Huzaifa was playing with matchsticks when the fire suddenly broke out in the shop.

It said that his testimony was also supported by two other eyewitnesses, Mohammad Talha and Hamza Amir, who deposed that Huzaifa’s father, Naimatullah, used to hand over the shop to his underage son.

It said that, as per the call data record (CDR), Naimatullah was not present at the shop at the time of the incident.

The charge sheet also stated that the exit points of the building were locked or blocked, there were insufficient fire extinguishers and fire safety equipment, no fire hydrant system was installed and there was no arrangement of emergency back-up lights, as electricity was disconnected after the fire engulfed the building.

It further said that, as per the CDR of the management committee members, they had not made any call to the fire brigade or other rescue and emergency services and had shown negligence on their part. ...