KARACHI: Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry on Monday took suo motu notice of a massive bombing in a Shia-dominated neighbourhood of Karachi that killed 48 people and left around 200 injured.

The Supreme Court will hear the case on March 6. The top court has issued notices to Sindh Advocate General Abdul Fateh Malik and Inspector General (IG) of Sindh Police Fayyaz Ahmed Leghari to submit a detailed report over the deadly bombing.

The bomb exploded in Karachi’s Abbas Town, a Shia neighbourhood, as worshippers left mosques and ripped through two apartment blocks, setting one of them on fire and trapping people beneath piles of rubble.

It was the deadliest bombing in Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city and business hub, since at least 43 people died in an attack on Shia worshippers in December 2009.

The Supreme Court is already hearing a case over an earlier bombing on the ethnic Hazara Shia community in Quetta.

The Supreme Court ordered authorities to come up with a strategy to protect Shias after bomb attacks in the Quetta on January 10 and February 16 killed nearly 200 people.

The Quetta attacks on the Shia Hazaras were claimed by banned militant outfit Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ).

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the Karachi bombing.

According to Human Rights Watch, more than 400 members of the minority sect were killed in Pakistan last year, the deadliest year on record for Shias in the country.