Land grabber given ‘clean chit’

Koral assistant commissioner suspended for allowing illegal housing businesses to run

ISLAMABAD: The police have allegedly given a clean chit to the main culprit of the land mafia in the federal capital and have instead registered cases against 16 property dealers for fraudulently tapping around Rs11 billion from locals for illegal housing projects.

Further, the Koral Assistant Commissioner (AC) Asad Ullah, who had served as the additional collector revenue, has been suspended pending an investigation because the illegal housing scheme scam was running in his jurisdiction.

Besides this, The Express Tribune has learnt that the district administration has started collecting information on its staff who may have been involved in the criminal activity.

Earlier, sources said that the Islamabad administration had launched a crackdown against property dealers who were trading plots in unauthorised housing societies, including Ghauri Town, Green Nest and others. Their booking offices were sealed and managements were warned to keep themselves away from the business until investigations are completed. However, sources said that the district administration did not seal the main offices of these fraudulent property dealers. Rather, they sealed their subsidiary branches with alleged collusion from the Islamabad Police and Capital Development Authority (CDA) officials.

Later, CDA Enforcement Directorate in-charge filed an FIR in the Koral police station against them, stating that the influential property dealers had reopened their sealed offices.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 13^th, 2020.