KARACHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday allowed the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan to file an application to become a party in the appeals filed against a judgement of the Sindh High Court in the Baldia factory fire case.

Representing the MQM-P, senior counsel Dr Farogh Naseem argued that the SHC had made adverse remarks in the impugned judgement against the party.

He submitted that since the MQM was not a party in the proceedings before the SHC nor it was summoned, all adverse observations against it were in breach of natural justice.

He maintained that the impugned judgement was also incorrect as no case was made out against those who have been convicted. However, for such purpose separate leave petitions had been filed in the Supreme Court, which were pending at Islamabad, he added.

A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court headed by Justice Mohammad Ali Mazhar allowed the party to file an application to join the proceedings.

Muttahida’s former sector in-charge Abdul Rehman aka Bhola and party worker Zubair aka Chariya were sentenced to death by an antiterrorism court in September 2020 for setting the multi-storey Ali Enterprises garment factory on fire in Baldia Town on September 11, 2012.

In September 2023, the SHC had upheld the death penalty handed down to both the workers and set aside life term of four employees of the factory. Later, both the convicts had challenged the verdict in the Supreme Court.

The SHC had also dismissed an appeal filed by the state challenging the acquittal of then provincial minister for commerce and industries Rauf Siddiqui and three others by the ATC in the same case.

Over 260 workers, including 16 who have yet to be identified, were burnt alive when the multi-storey Ali Enterprises garment factory was set on fire in Baldia Town on September 11, 2012 in what became the deadliest industrial blaze in Pakistan’s history.

Published in Dawn, March 19th, 2026