ISLAMABAD, April 4: A gang in CDA's land directorate was busted for its alleged involvement in allotment of plots on bogus compensation claims in Sector E-12, sources in CDA told Dawn on Wednesday.

"About 20 fake files of allotment of plots were recovered from the offices of dealing assistants in the land directorate with fake signatures of senior officials of the directorate," said CDA's Director Land Capt (retired) Farid Ahmed. He said the files were concealed in a room and were recovered during surprise checking.

It was learnt that a gang had been active in the directorate for the last many years which prepared fake files of plots in the name of land-affected people in different areas.

According to municipal laws, the authority, at the time of acquisition of land, provides compensation to displaced owners in the form of cash besides allotting plot to each family.

The gang, in connivance with senior officials, prepared fake claims in the names of landholders and got allotted plots by the CDA.

"We found fake signatures of director, deputy directors and assistance directors in all the recovered files," he said.

Another CDA official said the civic authority had announced compensation package for the landowners of Sector E-12 some 25 years ago and there was a complete ban on fresh compensation claims.

He said the same mafia was involved in award of Kurri Model Village in which more than 1,000 fake claims were found and a case registered against the accused persons by Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

A source in the civic authority said the land directorate was always reluctant to prepare a computerised list of landholders as a result of which some persons managed to get plots on fake claims.

"Had the list been computerised, no one would have committed land-related crimes," the source said.

The land directorate is worst hit by scams as it faced highest number of cases ever registered by the FIA and NAB against CDA officials.- Syed Irfan Raza