RAWALPINDI, Jan 26: The Tehsil Municipal Administration (TMA) on Wednesday declared 48 housing schemes, operating within its revenue limits, illegal and warned the public against investing there.

These housing schemes are located in the area falling outside the 66 revenue states of Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA). "The RDA would notify the legal status of the schemes operating in its area," an official said.

The 48 housing schemes declared illegal are Defence Garden, Chakri Road; Imtiaz Town, Chakri Road; Kurtaba City, Near Motorway; City Model Town, Pakistan Government Employees Housing Society, National Agro-City, Gulshan-i-Kashmir, Shad Abad Town, Posh City, Imtiaz Town, Rehman Town, New Islamabad, Gulshan-i- Mohammadi, Al-Badar Motorway Town, Khan Model Town, Saad Town, Khyber City, Motorway Land, Rabia Model Colony, Sanam Valley Scheme, Ex-Service Phase-I, Ex-Service Phase-II, Sara Town, Kurtaba Farming Housing, Osama Town, Gulf City, Asad Town, Al- Badar Associates, New Islamabad City, Rawalpindi Green City, Hina Town, Jafferiya Town, Gulshan-i-Sangral, Pindi Dairy Town, Gulshan-i-Shehryar, City Model Town Phase-II, Defence Valley, Pak PWD Housing Scheme, PARC, Pir Mehr Ali Shah, New Iqra City, Khan Village, Al-Haram City, Chinar Valley, Banker's City, Awam City and Daniyal Town.

These housing schemes had been declared illegal as they were started without fulfilling the official requirements for registration and initiation of housing schemes. "None of them had been accorded approval by the TMA," an official said.

The basic flaw, an official said, was that most of these schemes either did not have ownership documents or have partial documents making them outrightly dubious. Besides, these schemes do not have their water supply.

Tehsil Nazim Raja Hamid Nawaz said these housing societies were defrauding the people by offering them plots to build houses in "well developed housing schemes" on cheap rates.

"We fear that many of these operators would run away with the hard earned money of the people of the city." Replying to a question, another official said, he was not sure if any legal housing scheme was operating within the TMA limits other than those possessing the RDA permission.

The TMA has initiated legal action against the operators of these schemes and has banned their advertisement. "We have issued notices to the operators and have submitted challans before the courts against these housing schemes," the official said.

The district coordination officer and district officer (revenue) have been asked by the TMA not to accept the Sale Deeds/Registries and Authority Letters (Mukhtarnama) of these housing schemes.