September 07, 2008	Sunday	Ramazan 06, 1429

KARACHI, Sept 6: A Sindh High Court inquiry tribunal investigating the April 9, 2008 violence was told on Saturday that the city’s fire department was not capable of carrying out a rescue operation mainly in Tahir Plaza, where six persons were burnt to death in an arson attack, as its vehicles and staff were denied security by the police amid the serious law and order situation.

In its first open proceedings, the tribunal headed by Justice Nadeem Azhar Siddiqui examined some 10 witnesses, including firefighters who conducted the Tahir Plaza operation, but to various questions put to the firemen, it was revealed that they could not reach the affected building on time due to intense firing in the area and lawlessness with no protection from the law enforcers.

“The area where the building is situated is very congested and one can’t move freely,” stated Ehtishamuddin, chief fire officer of the city government. “Secondly, we are supposed to conduct rescue operations but most of the time, we are not provided with due security, which endangers our vehicles and staff members. Amid heavy gunfire on April 9, our fire tenders rushed to the spot but could not make to it and returned from halfway.”

After the four officers of different fire stations – Saddar, Boultan Market, Central Fire Station and Lyari – appeared in the tribunal and testified before it, the tribunal was also submitted a paper with recommendations by the chief fire officer for a better performance of the fire department in such incidents.

The fire department has sought some 5,000 staff members for the city with 129 fire stations across the metropolis. Currently the city government-run fire department operates only 21 fires stations with a 950-strong workforce. The department owns some 32 fire tenders for the whole city, but it has recommended that at least 300 such vehicles are required in Karachi.

“It was actually submitted by their chief fire officer to pinpoint some bottlenecks in the whole system of their department, which affect their performance,” Additional Advocate-General Sarwar Khan, who has been appointed to assist the tribunal, told reporters outside the courtroom after the proceedings, when asked about the reasons behind filing such recommendations to the inquiry tribunal.

The tribunal, which was set up in June by the Sindh government with the terms of reference being “to find out (the) reasons and people behind the widespread violence in which 10 people were killed and more than 60 vehicles were set on fire” adjourned its proceedings till Sept 13 after hearing five other witnesses – medico-legal officers from the Civil and Abbasi Shaheed hospitals – who treated the wounded and received bodies on April 9.

At least 10 people lost their lives – six of them burnt to death in an arson attack on Tahir Plaza on M.A. Jinnah Road – when violence erupted in the city after groups of lawyers clashed at the City Courts a day after the manhandling of former federal minister Dr Sher Afgan Khan Niazi in Lahore.

Police record shows that a total of five people were wounded in the day-long violence and 61 vehicles were set on fire in the large-scale violence in different parts of the city.

The tribunal had summoned six doctors, who came in contact with the victims of the April 9 violence, but it recorded statements of five officers, as one of them did not turn up. Each of them gave details of the victims they treated and presented reports of autopsies of the bodies they conducted.

However, the tribunal was surprised to note the same timings and durations of autopsies of bodies of two victims, who were burnt to death in Tahir Plaza, stated by one of the doctors at the Civil Hospital.

Dr Nisar Ali Shah submitted that on April 9 he conducted autopsies of two bodies in an hour but, interestingly, as per his statement he started examination of both victims at 9.30pm and concluded at 10.30pm.

“How is it humanly possible that you conducted autopsy of two bodies at the same time?” asked Justice Siddiqui, lashing out at the doctor that such a non-professional approach cast doubt over the whole system of medico-legal examination.

“The way you stated it seems that all of the task regarding autopsy was done by subordinates and even the sanitary workers and you people are there just to sign the report,” he remarked.

The tribunal also examined four other doctors, as it was told by SSP Niaz Khoso, who is working with the tribunal as a liaison officer, that one of the witnesses, Dr Iftikhar Memon, had not come to be testified. The tribunal later asked the liaison officer to call him again on the next date of hearing.