KARACHI: An antiterrorism court on Saturday summoned Muttahida Qaumi Movement lawmaker Rauf Siddiqui asking him to appear in court on Nov 4 in the Baldia factory fire case.

The same court also dismissed an application filed by the factory owners seeking possession of the industrial unit.

The owners of the ill-fated garment factory, through their lawyer, moved an application in court asking it to hand over the factory back to them for renovation.

Special Public Prosecutor Sajid Mahboob, however, opposed the plea and submitted that it might damage the case of the prosecution since the factory was a case property.

He requested the court not to hand over the industrial unit till the conclusion of the trial.

After hearing both sides, the ATC-VII judge dismissed the application.

The court has dismissed the owners’ plea for factory’s possession

The judge also issued a notice to MQM lawmaker Siddiqui to appear along with his lawyer in court on Nov 4 to respond to an application of the prosecution.

In a previous hearing, the prosecutor submitted that police had not chargesheeted Mr Siddiqui for lack of evidence despite the fact that there was sufficient evidence available to connect him with the commission of the crime.

He asked the court to summon him as an accused to face the trial.

According to a supplementary charge-sheet, Abdul Rehman alias Bhola, who was brought back after his arrest in Bangkok through Interpol in December, during interrogation as well as before a magistrate disclosed that he with Zubair alias Charya, and others set the factory ablaze on the instruction of then chief of the MQM organising committee Hammad Siddiqui as the factory owners had refused to pay the demanded protection money and “partnership”.

The suspect also said that after the incident Rauf Siddiqui allegedly got a case registered against the owners of the industrial unit and then the suspect said that he came to know that Rauf and Hammad received Rs40-50 million from the owners to tone down the case against them.

The supplementary report further said that sufficient evidence was not found against the MQM lawmaker, who joined the investigation and denied all charges.

Over 250 workers died in a fire in the multistorey garment factory building in Baldia Town in September 2012.

Order reserved on Rangers’ plea against Dr Asim

An antiterrorism court on Saturday reserved its order on an application of Rangers asking the court to seek the report of a joint investigation team from the home department and make it part of the proceedings in a case against former federal minister Dr Asim Hussain and six other politicians.

The Rangers, who are complainants of the case, through their lawyer Sajid Shaikh moved the application under Section 540 of the Criminal Procedure Code.

The counsel submitted that the FIR was lodged on the basis of the JIT report and it was not challenged by the defence.

However, defence lawyers Amir Raza Naqvi, Shaukat Hayat and others challenged the maintainability of the application and argued that the counsel for the complainant could not directly move any application but through the prosecutor.

They further contended that the JIT report was not a substantial evidence and it had no legal value in the eyes of law.

They added that it was also not part of the investigation since not a single member of the JIT was named as witness in the charge-sheet.

Special Public Prosecutor Ayaz Tunio did not oppose the application.

After hearing arguments, the ATC-II judge reserved the order on the application till Oct 30.

PPP’s Karachi division president Dr Asim, a close aide to former president Asif Ali Zardari, has been charged with allegedly treating and harbouring suspected terrorists, political militants and gangsters at his hospital at the behest of Karachi Mayor Wasim Akhtar, Pak Sarzameen Party president Anis Kaimkhani, Muttahida Qaumi Movement lawmaker Rauf Siddiqui, PPP leader Abdul Qadir Patel, former MQM leader Saleem Shahzad and Pasban leader Usman Moazzam.

Published in Dawn, October 15th, 2017