Judicial commission questions Mir Raza Ali's business partner over irregularities

Also present during the proceedings were Ali's family, their lawyer Jibran Nasir, Sindh government's focal person, additional home secretary, Sharae Faisal Sub-Divisional Police Officer (SDPO) Arshad Afridi, Ferozabad Station House Officer (SHO) Adeel Afzal, Ali's brother, friends, and driver Ehsan Ali. During a tense exchange, Justice Sial admonished Bhurday for what he described as suspicious conduct.

“Mir Raza was a dear friend, yet you were only worried about money — why did you get pre-arrest bail?” the judge remarked, courtroom.

Bhurday, who known Ali since first grade and had started the Wafflix dessert business with him in 2020, faced rigorous questioning about his visit to Ali's house on the morning of July 28, within hours of Ali's disappearance.

He admitted going to the house at 8am with his brother Abdullah and others, entering Ali's room, and finding his wallet, charger and keys there. He also revealed that Ali kept hashish in cigarette packets on a shelf at home, a disclosure the commission questioned as unnecessary for a witness seeking to “clear himself”.

Read:SHC rejects family plea seeking formation of JIT in Mir Raza murder case. The commission also pressed Bhurday on why he had sought access to Ali's Apple Watch while the family was still searching for him, and why he had allegedly asked Ali's sister to email the watch's data to his own account.

Bhurday claimed his brother Abdullah and friend Raziq had assisted the sister, but the commission expressed scepticism, noting that Bhurday appeared to know details he could only have learned if he were present. Financial irregularities surrounding the business also came under scrutiny.

Bhurday two partners withdrew Rs5,000 daily for personal expenses and received weekly Food Panda payments of Rs600,000 to Rs800,000. However, when questioned about a Rs4.5 million investment by Ehsan Anis Shamshi, whose documents showed he owned 30 per cent of the business, Bhurday initially denied knowledge before admitting Ali had taken the cash home.

The commission expressed surprise that Bhurday had not mentioned this substantial sum, yet had been anxious about vendor payments during the disappearance.

The commission further questioned Bhurday about why the business's vendor contact number had been changed two months before to his cousin Wasiq Bhurday's name rather than his own or Ali's, and why his email and mobile number appeared in Ali's i. Cloud account.

Bhurday said he did not remember the number and only learned of the i. Cloud link during the investigation. CCTV footage from Wafflix Bahadurabad franchise also featured prominently in the hearing.

Bhurday said he had accessed the cameras on the night of July 28 after being informed that a guard's pistol was missing, extracted brief clips, and took them to Ferozabad Police Station.

The commission questioned why he had not shown the complete footage to the family first, and why no memo was prepared when the full DVR was allegedly handed to police three days later. “You extracted two-second clips of your own interest and gave them to the police,” Justice Sial remarked.

Read More:Mir Raza death not a suicide, SHC told. The commission also recorded the statement of online taxi driver Ehsanullah, who provided what may be the last known account of Ali's movements.

The driver said he received a booking at 3:57am on July 28, picked up Ali from Khalid Bin Waleed Road at 4:09am, and dropped him in Gulistan-e-Jauhar Block 2 at 4:28am.

He said Ali had directed him to drive on the wrong side of the road, asked him to speed and played music from his phone at full volume during the ride. The driver, who said his company had since taken back his vehicle, -off location was desolate.

Another cruel reality of our society exposed in judicial commission proceedings today.#Mir. Raza's@bykeapkdriver Ihsanullah who from day one cooperated with family & investigation was evicted by police & Bykea vehicle taken back & fired for getting involved in a police case P1/2— M.

Jibran Nasir 🇵🇸 (@MJibran. Nasir)September 3, 2026SDPO Afridi's testimony took a dramatic turn when he initially denied showing CCTV footage to Ali's family or suggesting the death was a suicide. Under sustained grilling from Justice Sial, who warned him he was “leading himself towards dismissal”, Afridi admitted that police had indeed shown footage to the family.

Ali's mother had shown videos from Wafflix and other locations, telling them, “See, Mir Raza is going alone. "Bhurday, who supplied chocolate to Wafflix, given Ali Rs750,000 for cryptocurrency trading — a personal dealing unrelated to the business.

He denied searching Ali's room, though he admitted being present when others did. The commission noted that Abdullah had copied payment notices from Ali's watch to his own device. After the hearing, Bhurday’s lawyer, Khalid Mumtaz, commission had treated his client like a suspect despite his cooperating with the investigation since July 30.

“There is not a single thing against Bhurday. He attended Mir Raza's chehlum," Mumtaz said, adding that Ali had disappeared briefly in the past as well, including trips to Islamabad. Nasir, Ali's family's lawyer, countered that the investigation had been riddled with lapses.

"The smartwatch seizure memo was not made, the family was not made witnesses, and samples were not collected for six days," he said, adding that an appeal would be filed next week against a recent SHC decision in the case.

The commission summoned former SHO of PS Gulistan-e-Jauhar Kamran Qureshi and Head Moharar Zeeshan for the next hearing, and adjourned proceedings until September 7.

Case developmentsA judicial commission was formed on therequestof the Sindh government to probe the death of Ali, who was allegedlykidnappedfrom PECHS before his body was found in bushes near a wedding hall in Karachi's Gulistan-e-Johar on July 29. The case had initially been surrounded by uncertainty over whether he had been murdered or died by suicide.

The first post-mortem findings contained discrepancies and omissions, leading to asecond post-mortemthat confirmed his murder.

Consequently, considering the probe "botched", the family filed a petition in the SHC seeking the formation of JIT.During earlier hearings regarding the formation of JIT, the investigating officer probing the death of Ali weretreatingthe case as murder and had ruled out suicide based on the post-mortem findings.

DSP Siraj Lashari said the investigation had restarted “from zero” on August 13 and was being conducted using digital evidence, including CCTV footage. Investigators had recovered a bullet casing but had yet to find the weapon, while final post-mortem and forensic reports were still awaited.

Separately, the judicial commissionconvenedits second hearing on Monday, September 1, wherein it grilled Medico-Legal Officer Dr Usama Sheikh over discrepancies in the first post-mortem report filed by him. The commission also recorded the statements of the victim's family and Edhi volunteers who shifted his body during the hearing.

After the conclusion of the second hearing, lawyer Nasir said the first account of the MLO proved that he was correct about the "botched probe" and, since the commission was not tasked with the probe and can only oversee it, he reiterated that a JIT was crucial for a transparent investigation into the case.