LAHORE: An accountability court on Wednesday extended the judicial remand of senior bureaucrat Fawad Hassan Fawad, former Lahore Development Authority (LDA) director general (DG) Ahad Cheema and others till November 14 in Ashiana-e-Iqbal Housing Society scam.
Besides Fawad and Cheema, Shahid Shafiq Faridi, Imtiaz Haider, Bilal Qidwai and others were produced before Accountability Court Judge Syed Najamul Hassan on expiry of their judicial remand.
The court was requested to issue directions for the return of Fawad’s laptop and other materials taken into custody by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) at the time of his arrest.
At this, the court sought arguments from the parties while extending the judicial remand of all the accused till November 14.
NAB had already filed a reference against Cheema and five others over their alleged role in Ashiana-e-Iqbal Housing Society scam.
According to the Ahad Cheema caused a loss of Rs660 million to the national exchequer in the Ashiana scam.
The project cost had increased to Rs3.4 billion, while 61,000 people who had applied for plots in the project suffered.
However, NAB had not filed reference against Fawad in the scam yet.
It is worth mentioning that NAB had also arrested Opposition Leader in National Assembly Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif in connection with Ashiana scam and he is on physical remand till November 7.
The contract for the housing scheme was won by a construction company titled Chaudhry Latif and Sons but former Punjab chief minister Shehbaz Sharif and his aides awarded the Rs14 billion contract to the ineligible Lahore Casa Developers.
Due to allegedly illegal cancellation of the contract, the government had to pay damages to the contractor. The cancellation of the contract also delayed the project, resulting in cost escalation of billions of rupees.