Pakistan, July 8 -- The easiest account of the Gul Plaza inferno is also the most convenient one: that a child allegedly struck a match, a shop caught fire and a terrible accident followed. It is a story that can fit into a police challan. It is also a story that risks burying the more important question raised by the deaths of 72 people and the destruction of more than 1,100 shops: how did a busy commercial building in the heart of Karachi become a chamber of smoke, from which so many could not escape?

The charge sheet, as reported, names six accused-an 11-year-old boy, his father who owned the artificial flower shop where the blaze is believed to have begun, and four members of the Gul Plaza Management Committee. There may well be evid...