MULTAN, July 24: The Pak-Arab Fertilizers factory has to be closed on Saturday following another gas leak, this time from its main ammonia plant.

Earlier, on Friday night about two dozen workers fell unconscious and some of them even sustained burn injuries when ammonia gas leaked from the nitro-phosphate plant.

The victims were shifted to various health facilities, including a medical centre of the factory, Social Security Hospital and Nishter Hospital.

Some of the victims were even provided medical cover at private hospitals allegedly as a part of management's bid to downplay the incident.

In a press note issued here on Saturday, factory managing director Tanvir Ahmed termed the Friday night "mishap a minor incident as such incidents do happen when plants are restarted after annual turnaround."

The press note further stated that the leakage of ammonia from safety valve at the NP plant caused difficulty in breathing to some of the employees working nearby. It was further claimed in the note that except the NP plant all the remaining five plants of the factory were working safe and sound. However, later in the evening the ammonia plant also developed fault at its section 102-C and the gas started leaking from the affected portion.

Subsequently, the production activity had to be halted completely. It was learnt that the factory would remain inoperative for the next three days while two more days would be needed to get it into full operation.

The Pak-Arab Fertilizers is among the few big fertilizer industrial units in the country. Its daily production is said to be 2,700 tons. The government of Pakistan has 52 per cent shares in the factory while rest of the 48 per cent shares are with a business house of Abu Dhabi.

The factory had been out of production since July 1 this month in the wake of annual repairs. But frequent mishaps marred production activities since the management tried to restart the unit on Thursday last.

Factory's labour union (CBA) president Qaiser Javed criticised the management for terming the Friday night mishap a minor one. "More than 24 workers had fallen unconscious but the factory management was taking it as a routine matter."

He said the management had stopped investing in balancing, modernization and replacement of the machinery since the unit had been placed on the list of state-owned industrial units that were to be privatized.

Meanwhile, the district officer (environment) has issued a show-cause notice to the factory management terming the incident a disaster.