GUJRAT: The district administration on Saturday sealed the offices of three major housing societies in Sara-i-Alamgir town for allegedly committing gross irregularities and violations of the government rules.

The action has been taken on the directions of Gujrat Deputy Commissioner Nurulain Qureshi by a joint team of district council, land revenue department and police. Gujrat District Council Chief Officer Syed Faraz Mehdi led the action.

A senior official of the local administration said the Gujrat district council had sealed the offices of New Metro City, Citi Housing and Grand City as notices had earlier been sent to the management of these societies to stop selling the files for not having the required approvals and no objection certificates (NOCs) by the respective authorities.

However, he said, the management of these societies did not pay any heed to the notices as the Punjab government had also amended the rules according to which the societies could sell the plots through registration deeds after paying all the due taxes of the government instead of sticking to the previous practice of selling plots through files issued by the housing society.

Housing societies continue to sell files instead of sale through registration deeds

Moreover, he said, a number of applications were recently submitted to the Gujrat DC against these societies for not giving possession to their clients despite receiving the due amounts for long.

It is learnt that Additional Deputy Commissioner Revenue (ADCR) Waqas Safdar Sikandari has also issued notices to the management of these societies on the basis of the public complaints.

Official sources said the Gujrat DC had tasked the Sara-i-Alamgir tehsildar with taking the record of files of these housing societies into possession to assess the official fees and taxes pending against the sale of files that had to be sold through registration deeds.

A few months earlier, the land revenue department had detected a tax evasion of at least Rs420 million by Metro City and Grand City, and notices were issued to them to pay the amount; however, the management moved the Lahore High Court and got the stay orders against these notices.

Published in Dawn, May 10th, 2026