KARACHI: An alleged multi-billion-rupee land fraud has been unearthed within the Karachi Development Authority (KDA), involving eight premium commercial and residential plots valued at over Rs. 1 billion. In response to these revelations, the Director-General of KDA has officially taken notice of the scandal and established a high-level inquiry committee to investigate the matter. According to KDA insiders, a highly organized network comprising retired officers, private facilitators, and active department officials is allegedly running a systematic racket of forged land files, prompting the KDA Secretary to issue a formal notification directing the Director Land to submit a comprehensive investigation report within 15 days.
The fraudulent activities targeted premium properties located in some of Karachi’s most prime locations. Among the disputed tracts is a massive 875-square-yard commercial plot (SB-157) in Sector 11-A of Surjani Town, which was illegally disposed of through a fabricated 2007 auction file. Other prime properties caught in this scam include several plots in Gulistan-e-Johar (specifically plot SB-2 ST-10/A, plot B-70 and A-104 in Block 6, and plot B-159 in Block 7), alongside plot BS-57 in Block 7 of Federal B. Area, plot ST-8/5 in Block 10 of Gulshan-e-Iqbal, and another valuable commercial plot, SB-15, in Sector 6-C of Surjani Town.
However, the decision to entrust KDA’s own Director Land with this sensitive inquiry has triggered severe backlash from senior officials and civic circles, who have labeled the internal probe as ridiculous and a clear conflict of interest. Critics argue that an internal department-level investigation cannot guarantee an unbiased trial against highly influential administrative syndicates. Consequently, there is a growing and urgent demand from the public and senior administrative ranks to bypass internal KDA channels altogether and hand over the entire investigation to independent federal watchdogs, namely the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), to ensure accountability.
