Petition Filed in Islamabad High Court Seeking Judicial Commission for PIMS Hospital Tragedy
ISLAMABAD: A constitutional petition has been filed in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) to form a judicial commission to delve into the horrific incident of the fire in the PIMS hospital in the city in a detailed manner.
In the petition, Advocate Qasim Iqbal Jalali had sought the establishment of a judicial commission in Islamabad High Court for the investigation of the matter with the participation of a sitting High Court judge or a District and Sessions Judge (West).
Key Demands and Forensics Audit
The petitioner said the incident at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) was a devastating one on 26th August. The petition asks the court to conduct thorough forensic studies of the disaster and have a full safety audit performed on the hospital’s fire alarm system.
The federal government, the office of the Secretary of Interior and Secretary of Health and the Inspector General of Police (IGP) Islamabad have been invited to be respondents in the case.
Lack of Confidence in Government Fact-Finding Committee
The petitioner challenged the government-constituted fact-finding committee and said that the officers included in the committee had a conflicts of interest. He said that the fundamental principles of justice and the law rule that no one be the investigator and judge of his or her own case.
The petition claimed that the people’s trust in the government-appointed committee is so low that “a swarm of public opinion is missing faith in it”. It also pointed out that the Director General of Emergency could be among the persons responsible for failures in administration, which is a direct and unacceptable conflict of interest for him to be a member of the investigation committee.