Records of two district courts gutted in Karachi fire

KARACHI: Records and evidence of cases under trial in District South and East courts were reduced to ashes when a massive fire broke out in the warehouse of City Courts because of a suspected short-circuit.

Officials at the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) Fire Brigade’s central control room told The News that the fire broke out inside the warehouse at 2:31am.

Two fire tenders of KMC arrived at the site immediately and more trucks were dispatched when the flames leapt higher.

“An emergency was imposed in all fire stations and fire tenders were called in from across the city to bring it under control when explosives present inside the warehouse started going off,” officials said.

The blaze was finally brought under control after a hectic five-hour effort. Around 20 fire trucks, two water boozers and a snorkel took part in the fire-fighting operation.

Fire trucks were still present at the partially-burnt warehouse by the time this report was filed on Wednesday evening as the remains of the case property cooled off.

An emergency was also imposed on all Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) water hydrants on the directives of KWSB Managing Director Khalid Sheikh. Around 45,000 gallons of water was supplied to water boozers taking part in the fire-fighting operation brought in from Sakhi Hassan, NIPA Chowrangi and Safora Goth water hydrants.

Residents of the locality woke up when the explosives stored in the warehouse as case evidence and property detonated due to the raging fire. A heavy contingent of police and paramilitary Rangers reached site and got its surroundings vacated. According to City SSP Sheeraz Nazeer, arms, ammunition and valuables, recovered from suspects during police action, are placed in the warehouse as case property, which is usually handed to investigation officers during trial, who then submits it back to the warehouse after the hearing.

Case property and evidence from all Karachi districts is stored in the warehouse in different sections of the building. Nazeer said the warehouse was locked when the fire broke out.

Ruling out the possibility of the involvement of terrorists in the incident, SSP Nazeer said the cause of the fire would be made public once the investigation is completed.

He added that even though there were some CCTV cameras installed outside courtrooms, there were none installed inside or outside the damaged warehouse.

Nazeer said footage from the courtroom CCTV cameras would be used to ascertain the cause of the fire or people responsible for it.

Meanwhile, Inspector General Police AD Khowaja visited the City Courts on Wednesday morning and inspected the burnt warehouse.

Speaking to journalists, IGP Khowaja said that it seems a short circuit caused the fire in the building which was constructed in the British era.

“However, the final conclusion would be drawn after a thorough investigation,” he said. “Damage would be assessed once the fire is doused down completely.”

Briefing journalists outside City Courts, South-Zone DIGP Azad Khan said that police have started the process of geo-fencing to ascertain the cause of the fire.

He added that only the record and property of cases being tried in District South and District East courts was burned, while evidence of other districts’ case remain undamaged.

The DIGP said two teams have been formed to ascertain how much case record has been burned and to which police stations each of the records belonged.

He added the Bomb Disposal Squad would start inspection of the burnt warehouse on Thursday morning as inspection on Wednesday night would not prove as effective.

Courts remain closed

Following the fire, all district courts remained closed on Wednesday and scheduled case hearings were postponed.

All entry and exit gates to the courts’ premises remained closed and a heavy contingent of police and paramilitary Rangers was deployed to deal with any untoward incident.

The Sindh High Court registrar along with district and sessions judges inspected the warehouse. They were briefed by the fire brigade and police officials about steps taken to extinguish the blaze.

Meanwhile, the Karachi Bar Association (KBA) president expressed his deep concern over the fire, saying the KBA had been asking the authorities concerned to shift the record from the court premises to some other safe place, but remained unheard.

ATC hearing

Separately, an anti-terrorism court (ATC) on Wednesday adjourned the hearing in the case of an attack on late SSP Chaudhry Aslam till April 17 after a prosecution witness from the police department declined to identify the two detained accused.

Two accused Zafar alias Saaien and Ubaid alias Aabi were produced before the court. However, on the denial of the witness to identify them, the court directed the investigation officer to produce the other prosecution witnesses at the next hearing to record their statements.

The state attorney told the court that the same witness who refused to identify now had identified the two accused in his earlier statement. Chaudhry Aslam was killed in a bomb blast on January 9, 2014 in old Sabzi Mandi area.