he litigants said that CDA should first accommodate them against the newly announced plots. But the CDA managed a vacation of stay orders from the court and went ahead with the balloting. STOCK IMAGE
The balloting was done manually, contrary to the authority’s earlier claim to do it through ‘latest software’ designed by CDA’s information technology wing.
The civic agency had widely propagated the computerised balloting in the application forms as well as through a media campaign. But after all these claims to lure investors, the authority chose to do it in the same old manual way.
A total of 1,506 applicants had submitted the forms for 154 residential plots at the scheme.
The CDA, however, did not inform the public about the date through phone or advertisements, and only 150 applicants showed up for the balloting.
The committee tasked with overseeing the process of “fair balloting” had two boxes in front of it. One carried slips with names of applicants while the other had slips with plot numbers.
Audience members were asked to come on stage one by one and pick a slip each from the two boxes. Thus, the successful 154 candidates were selected out of 1,506 applicants.
Many of those present on the occasion raised concerns over the mode of balloting but were later pacified by CDA officials.
The authority, in a statement, said NAB, FIA and Amnesty International observed the balloting process. It, however, did not give names of officials present to monitor the event.
A list of the successful candidates has been published at the CDA website.
CDA Member Finance Arbab Bahadur said though the balloting was done manually, there was no objection during the proceedings.
He said the authority’s IT department had sent its software to NADRA for verification but it “pointed out some technical errors which were impossible to remove within the timeframe.”
He added that it was thus decided to conduct the balloting manually to ensure maximum transparency.
CDA sought applications for the project in December 2014 and sold some 1,979 broachers after which 1,506 people submitted applications with 10 per cent down payments for the plot.
The balloting process started after a brief delay of two and a half hours as some of the individuals, who were given plots at the scheme in 2011 but who later refunded their submitted amounts from CDA, moved court against the balloting.
The litigants said that CDA should first accommodate them against the newly announced plots. But the CDA managed a vacation of stay orders from the court and went ahead with the balloting.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 13th, 2015.
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