Land scam: NAB arrests assistant commissioner

HYDERABAD: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) arrested a second assistant commissioner in connection with a case of land scam in a housing colony in Hyderabad.

The NAB's spokesperson informed on Wednesday that the former assistant commissioner of Qasimabad, Shahnawaz Soomro, who was currently posted in Jati taluka of Thatta District, was arrested from Gulshan-e-Hadeed in Karachi.

The accused has been charged with verifying bogus revenue entries and issuing illegal documents for Memon Housing scheme in Qasimabad, in connivance with the real estate developers Abdul Ghaffar Dada and Rafique Solangi. The spokeperson said that the housing scheme, against which the NAB received over a hundred complaints, covered 24 acres.

Earlier on January 17, tapedar Imtiaz Solangi was also arrested in the same case. The NAB obtained his 14-day physical remand from the NAB court. Another assistant commissioner, Ali Zulfiqar Memon, was apprehended last month on December 23, who is currently in jail on judicial remand. He is also accused of collusion in the fraud when he was posted in Qasimabad. The spokesperson said that the revenue officials involved in the scam have been rounded up, however, the builders, Dada and Solangi, are still at large.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 19^th, 2017.