NAB recovers Rs637m through plea bargain

LAHORE: Yasir Hayat Tarar, a younger brother of Babar Hayat Tarar, incumbent Senior Member Board of Revenue (SMBR), Punjab, has struck a plea bargain deal with the National Accountability Bureau against Rs637 million.

Yasir Hayat Tarar had committed a fraud of Rs637 million in Professional Cooperative Housing Society, Lahore, by providing undeveloped chunks of land to the housing society at an inflated cost. Yasir Hayat Tarar is the real brother of Babar Hayat Tarar, a Grade-22 PAS officer incumbent SMBR. Babar Hayat Tarar was serving as Secretary Cooperatives Department, Punjab, in 2014 when this episode of fraud had started. According to the National Accountability Bureau, Yasir Hayat Tarar, son of Khizar Hayat Tarar, was the owner of M/s Asian Developers to the extent of 80pc shares at the time when the alleged fraud was committed. He through his frontmen and ‘benamidars’ ---- accused Muhammad llyas, Arslan Ahmad and Syed Muhammad Aon --- entered into an agreement with the administration of Professional Cooperative Housing Society as a land provider and developer.

The selection of M/s Asian Developer was actually non-transparent and illegal as accused Yasir Hayat Tarar was a friend of Muhammad Asghar, ex-general secretary of the society. Furthermore, Admin Manager, PCHS, vide letter dated 12.09.2019 had informed that the record regarding bidding documents of the other land providers and developers was not found except the profile of M/s Asian Developers and an agreement signed by society in June, 2015. It is also intimated by Admin Manager, PCHS that no record of evaluation criteria (technical or financial) and evaluation sheets of the bidding process were available and were never handed over to him in any capacity. This fact spells out that the M/s Asian Developer was selected by the society for being a friend of Muhammad Asghar, ex-general secretary of the society.

Following the order of the secretary, PCHS had signed a joint venture with Asian Developers to procure approximately 500 acres on Ferozepur Road adjacent to the proposed Lahore Ring Road (village Jia Bagga and Karyal). It was also agreed that payments to the developer would be made after getting the sale deeds registered and possession of the purchased land in favor of the society at the rate of Rs7.6 million on each transfer of one-acre land. However, the management committee, in violation of the signed agreement and without approval from the cooperative department, had issued payments to the developer from August 2015.

Due to this fraudulent activity, instead of Rs7.6 million per acre, the society had agreed to pay a highly inflated amount of Rs20 million per acre from July, 1, 2016 to June 2017 to the developer and similarly, Rs24 million per acre for the period commencing from July 1, 2017, and onwards. The record shows that the society had so far paid an amount of Rs811 million to the accused developer whereas the actual payment calculated based on average rates of each mauza is Rs173 million only.

The record shows that he had provided land measuring 459 Kanal-5 Marla approximately as per 56 registered sale deeds out of which 100 Kanal-19 Marla land fell in the green area and only 358K-5M land is available. Furthermore, 100K-19M land falling in the green area was sold by him and others to private persons at lesser rates as compared to rates at which land was provided by him to society, which shows the mala fide intentions of the accused for commission of offence.

If this was not all, the land so provided by the accused to the society was in chunks and pieces with considerable distances between them (in violation of agreement) which were not suitable to establish a housing society. It also surfaced that the land provided by the accused and others was purchased at exorbitant rates. He also could not justify the land rates fixed in the original agreement as well as in the amended agreement. The rates increased in the amended agreement were revised on the request of the accused firm based on fake quotations prepared on letterheads of some property dealers.

He was bound to hand over the developed plots to the society members within 36 months of the signing of the agreement. However, since June 22, 2018, no development had been made on site and none of the plots were handed over to the society members. He was also bound to get the approval of the layout plan of the society from the LDA which was not obtained at that time by him and society is still considered to be illegal as per LDA record.

The accused had received, Rs811,237,000 from the society against the terms and conditions of the agreement and no document was brought on record regarding the actual payments made to the land sellers. During the course of investigation, he was arrested by the NAB. However, he was released by the court Thursday after it approved the plea bargain deal filed by the accused.