A district court on Thursday handed over two Capital Development Authority officials to the FIA on a two-day physical remand for their involvement in the Kurri land scam. Capital Development Authority (CDA) Revenue Assistant Director Mian Aftab Ahmed and Land and Rehabilitation Directorate Assistant Admin Officer Asghar Ali were arrested and produced before duty Judge Usman Ali Awan on Thursday.
The FIA registered a case on August 17 against nine officials of the CDA for their alleged involvement in the Kurri land scam.
The first information report (FIR) was registered against former land and Rehabilitation director Waseem Shamshad, Deputy Director Abdul Rasheed, Asghar Ali, Technical Assistant Director Malik Mumtaz, Sub-Engineer Khaid Khokhar, Mian Aftab Ahmed, Naib Tehsildar Ghulam Ali, Gardawar Ghaniur Rehman and Patwari Shahid Mehmood under sections 409/ 420/ 468/ 471/ 109 PPC r/w 5(2) 47 of the PCA.
According to the FIA, gross irregularities and illegalities had been committed during the survey of Build Up Property (BUP) and allotments of residential plots in Kurri Model Village, Zone IV, Islamabad by then CDA Land and Rehabilitation director Waseem Shamshad Ali, in connivance with the above accused.
Aftab Ahmed managed to enter fake BUPs and fake names of affected in the Urdu List with malefic intentions and personal gain due to which hundreds of plots were allotted to the fake affectees and compensation worth hundreds of millions of rupees has been processed.
The other accused, Azhar Ali, processed the files of the plots in contravention to the procedures and by-laws prescribed by the CDA. Moreover, he did not maintain the plot allotment files deliberately. Consequently, the government exchequer incurred heavy losses. Ali and Ahmed were arrested on August 17, 2011. The FIA said Shamshad had been removed from the CDA last year after being accused of allotting hundreds of fake plots in a compensation package given to villagers of Kurri, where the CDA had acquired their land in order to develop a model village. The Cabinet Division had sent its report on the scam to Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani who ordered the suspension of the director. However, Shamshad claimed innocence, vowing to expose the “main characters” at an appropriate time.
The FIA said the CDA chairman had recently also revealed that in his absence, Shamshad had issued 500 allotment letters of residential plots in a single day followed by another 400 the very next day. A total of 3,961 allotment letters were issued of which more than 2,400 did not have approval. Complaints about fake entries in the award list were lodged with the CDA office chairman and with Estate and the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) members, after which all the allotment letters were cancelled. On Thursday, FIA produced both the accused before court and requested a physical remand of 14 days to track the illegal money and successfully recover it from the accused. However, the said judge only allowed a two-day remand.
