Prosecution witness testifies in Bahria Town land scam case

KARACHI: An accountability court on Wednesday recorded the statement of a prosecution witness and summoned two others to testify on the next date of hearing in a case pertaining to alleged illegal amalgamation of commercial land to Bahria Town for a multistorey building in Karachi.

Then mayor Mustafa Kamal, then district coordination officer Fazlur Rehman, then executive district officer Iftikhar Qaimkhani, then district officer Mumtaz Haider, then additional DO Syed Nishat Ali and then sub-registrar-II, Clifton, Nazir Zardari have been charged with corruption of around Rs2 billion in the case.

Four builders — Mohammad Dawood, Mohammad Yaqoob, Mohammad Irfan and Mohammad Rafiq — associated with DJ Builders and Developers, have also been indicted in the same case.

On Wednesday, the matter came up before Accountability Court-III judge Dr Sher Bano Karim, when special public prosecutor Zahid Hussain Baladi produced a prosecution witness for recording his statement.

The witness, Munawar Hasan Siddiqui, a government officer, recorded his statement and also submitted the relevant documents.

Two builders’ application for plea bargain with NAB disposed of

After recording his testimony, the judge summoned two other witnesses to record their statements on next date of hearing, and adjourned the hearing till Jan 23.

According to NAB, the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation in 1982 created 198 stalls/shops on two amenity plots adjacent to the Kothari Parade for dislocated hawkers while four commercial plots, each measuring 255.55 square yards, were also created in the locality.

It alleged that DJ Builders purchased four commercial plots and 198 stalls of the hawkers. However, the two amenity plots were never transferred in the builder’s name.

NAB further alleged that Zain Malik and others associated with DJ Builders in connivance with the then Karachi mayor, the then DCO and others unlawfully got transferred 102 stalls in favour of Bahria Town Private Limited through a conveyance deed without obtaining permission from the Karachi Development Authority.

The reference claimed that the price of these stalls was shown in the registration deed as only Rs260 million whereas the market value was assessed at Rs2.155bn and forced sale value was adjudged at Rs1.724bn.

It claimed Zain Malik was the subsequent beneficiary of the amalgamated plot, which was illegally transferred in the name of Bahria Town with active connivance of the main beneficiary (DJ Builders and Developers) and the sub-registrar-II, Clifton.

Plea bargain of builders

Meanwhile, administrative judge of the accountability courts Abdul Ghani Soomro on Wednesday disposed of an application filed by two builders pleading to accept their plea bargain with NAB in a case pertaining to cheating the public at large and “for not fulfilling basic requirements’’.

NAB booked and detained Haji Adam Jokhio and Lal Mohammad for defrauding around 1,100 allottees of a commercial project launched in 1992 and resold in 2013. The land in question is estimated to be valued at Rs3.5bn, it added.

In February, investigating officer of the case Khalid Khan had filed an application under Section 25(b) of the National Accountability Ordinance, 1999, submitting that the NAB director general had accepted the plea bargain of the accused persons, therefore, the court was asked to approve the same.

On Wednesday, taking up the matter the administrative judge noted that a similar application of plea bargain was earlier filed by then IO of the case Sarwar Ahmed Khan, but the court had on Dec 11, 2019 dismissed the plea bargain application of Lal Mohammad with an application seeking release of co-accused Adam Khan since the NAB authorities had not worked out the ‘loss’.

He added that the court had referred the matter to the then NAB chairman to constitute a committee to conduct an inquiry against IO Khan for acts of his malpractice and compromises with the accused persons in addition to directing the NAB chief to change the IO of the case.

The judge noted that the court had on March 11 directed the accused persons that all the claimants/allottees be taken on board and terms of the plea bargain be mutually settled between them; the mode and rate of the refund payment wherever be worked out and the surety or guarantee be obtained from the accused persons as a joint affidavit filed by the two accused had no legal value. But the judge noted that its direction had not been complied with in letter and spirit.

He further noted that a fresh no-objection certificate from the Sindh Building Control Authority was also yet to be obtained by the accused and the development work too remained to be completed. Besides, there was unwillingness of a majority of the claimants/allottees to accept plot(s) in the Gulshan-i-Elahi project, as offered by the accused, since the said project was already under a separate investigation, the judge added.

The judge observed that in such circumstances the claimants/allottees, who had been waiting since 1992, could justifiably ask for full compliance of the stipulations of the plea bargain first. He added that the contention of the counsel for the accused persons that the timeline for allotment of the plots to the claimants shall take effect after approval of the plea bargain, does not carry substance, as it was not mentioned in the affidavit filed by the accused or in the plea bargain application.

The judge noted that the record showed that accused Adam Jokhio was old with feeble health while Lal Mohammad was in jail owning to conviction in a case of a similar nature, which not only makes one cautious to effectively secure and safeguard interests of the claimants/allottees but to ensure that the claimants/allottees were not again left at the mercy of the accused or kept wandering after the accused.

Therefore, the judge noted that “in view of the above factors, I find it difficult to approve plea bargain without first sorting out all the above issues and fully complying with the directions of this court issued on March 11”.

The judge disposed of the application saying that the accused would be at liberty to file a fresh plea bargain after all the issues highlighted above were adequately sorted out taking all the claimants/allottees on board and making the requisite compliance.

NAB alleged that the accused persons had launched the project on 70 acres and collected millions of rupees from hundreds of allottees in 1992, adding that later they split the same piece of land on which another builder launched a separate project.

Published in Dawn, December 24th, 2020