ISLAMABAD: When Idrees Khan held his newborn son in his arms shortly after 3:40 a.m. on Wednesday, he recited the Muslim call to prayer in his ear and named him Muhammad, marking what should have been a day of celebration for his family.

The child was born on 12th Rabi Al-Awwal, the day on which Muslims commemorate the birth of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), giving the choice of name particular significance for Khan. What should have been a day of religious and personal celebration would, within hours, become one of unimaginable loss.

Less than two hours later, Khan returned to the nursery at Islamabad’s Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) to collect his son after what he had been told would be a routine check-up and found the ward engulfed in smoke and fire.

Muhammad was among 14 newborns who died in the blaze at the Mother and Child Hospital of PIMS, one of the largest state-run hospitals in Pakistan’s capital. The deaths have triggered multiple investigations and renewed scrutiny of fire safety at public facilities in Islamabad, where authorities said earlier this year that most of thousands of buildings surveyed lacked required fire-safety approvals or certificates.

“The baby came into my hand [after his birth and] I recited the prayer call in his ear,” Khan, 25, told Arab News outside PIMS on Thursday. “It was the 12th day of Rabi Al-Awwal. I named my child Muhammad, after the Prophet [PBUH].”

Khan, who comes from Pathargarh village near Wah Cantt, around 50 kilometers northwest of Islamabad, said Muhammad had been born after four years of prayers and waiting.

His wife remained admitted at PIMS on Thursday following surgery, while Khan moved between the hospital and his village, where Muhammad was buried on Wednesday afternoon.

“As soon as he was born, they said that he would undergo a normal routine check-up in the nursery,” Khan said. “So, I took him to the nursery and handed him over to them. They told me to come back after an hour and take my son away.”

Khan said he returned about an hour and a half later and found smoke and fire around the nursery:

“As soon as I tried to go inside the nursery, the door was locked from inside. The nurses and the doctors from the nursery were not there.”

Khan said he and several other people tried desperately to force their way into the nursery as smoke filled the area.

“We kicked the door and [bruised] our hands,” he said. “We broke the glass to let the smoke out.”

Khan said they eventually managed to enter.

“It was just smoke. There was a fire in the nursery. And the kids were just burnt.”

His account is one of several from families and witnesses that have raised questions about access to the nursery and the response during the first minutes of the blaze.

A fire incident report by Islamabad’s Capital Development Authority (CDA) said emergency exits or escape routes at the hospital were found “permanently locked from outside / obstructed” and described fire and life-safety arrangements as inadequate and below required standards. The report also said hospital security staff hindered the fire crew’s initial response.

PIMS has disputed part of that account, saying all emergency exits were “fully open and operational” and that two doctors and two nurses inside the nursery responded immediately before security staff joined efforts to rescue the babies.

The conflicting accounts are among the issues now being examined by investigators.

PIMS has said the fire began at 6:38 a.m. A CDA incident report records the first emergency call at 6:54 a.m., a fire crew being dispatched at 6:55 a.m. and first responders arriving at 7:01 a.m. The report does not explain the 16-minute interval between the time PIMS says the blaze began and the first recorded emergency call.

Khan estimated that rescue teams arrived around half an hour after he encountered the fire. His recollection could not independently be reconciled with the official emergency timeline.

The precise cause of the blaze also remains under investigation. The CDA’s preliminary incident report lists an “electric short circuit / plug overload” as the probable cause, while PIMS has said an initial spark was followed within seconds by a massive fire because oxygen points were installed at each incubator.

The chairman of the National Assembly Standing Committee on National Health Services, Dr. Mahesh Kumar Malani, who visited PIMS on Thursday, has meanwhile questioned an earlier account linking the fire to an air conditioner, saying after visiting the hospital that CCTV footage showed the unit was switched off.

The tragedy has also focused attention on broader fire-safety problems in the Pakistani capital. A 2026 CDA survey of 6,500 public and private buildings, including 300 government facilities, found most had not obtained approval for fire-safety plans or been issued completion and fire-safety certificates.

For Khan, however, the questions surrounding institutional responsibility were inseparable from the loss of a son he had held only hours earlier.

“It was the government’s fault, or that of the administration here, because this is a government hospital,” he said.

Outside PIMS on Thursday, Khan’s elderly mother and sister sat on the lawn while he continued making arrangements for his wife’s treatment, including medicines, blood and medical tests.

Khan said no senior government representative had contacted him by then to offer condolences.

“The health minister hasn’t called us yet, saying: ‘This has happened to you, and we apologize to you.’“

“They don’t have any realization,” he continued. “They would only have cared if the health minister’s own son was admitted here.”

Acting Health Ministry Secretary Muhammad Mahmood told Arab News he had spoken to Health Minister Syed Mustafa Kamal about meeting the bereaved families and said the minister planned to visit them.

“The slight delay happened because, firstly, we were dealing with this emergency matter, and secondly, the minister was of the view that we should take some compensation along, so that the redressal is not just limited to words,” Mahmood said.

“I advised him that he should go now, meet them, listen to their grievances, express condolences to them, and as soon as the government process is done, because sometimes it takes a couple of days, then he can go back again and hand over the compensation,” he added.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has appointed a high-level inquiry committee headed by former federal secretary Shahid Khan to investigate the fire and suspended Federal Health Secretary Aslam Ghauri following the deaths.

The committee visited PIMS on Thursday and was directed to submit preliminary recommendations within 48 hours and a full report within five days.

For Khan, the demand was simpler.

Asked what he wanted from the government after losing his newborn son, he said:

“This shouldn’t happen again.”