That Pakistani firm has a controversial reputation largely because of its unusually high rate of approvals, doing inspections that led to 118 SA8000 certificates between 2007 and 2012. In contrast, a larger auditing firm, Bureau Veritas, awarded 46 certificates in Pakistan over a period twice as long.

RI&CA’s flurry of accreditations worried a team of English monitors led by Vic Thorpe and Stirling Smith, who often went to Pakistan to check on inspectors’ operations. “It seems very fishy,” Mr. Smith said. “They’ve certified so many factories compared to the other players, so you wonder.”

Mr. Thorpe said he conveyed his concerns to Social Accountability International. Its compliance arm did step up its oversight, but no further action was taken. Several monitors in Pakistan questioned why the local firm was able to do so many inspections for so many years with seemingly little oversight.

But it was not entirely surprising. Industry experts say that in the battle for market share, profit-making inspection firms are often tempted to be less rigorous because that makes them more attractive to apparel manufacturers eager for certification.

RINA’s certification business in Pakistan was bolstered by its partner’s embrace of a controversial subsidy program. Since 2007, the Commerce Ministry has offered companies up to 400,000 rupees, or $4,100, toward the cost of an SA8000 inspection as part of a drive to promote the clothing industry.

But the program has a twist. The entire subsidy is payable only if the factory is awarded certification. This creates a conflict of interest that skews the process in favor of approval, critics say.

Ms. Tepper Marlin said these subsidies concerned her group enough that in 2011 it wrote to RINA and the two other firms accredited to perform SA8000 inspections in Pakistan, advising them to stop accepting the subsidies that the factories pass on to them unless they could demonstrate their impartiality.