Daily Times

In a recent development, Fazaia housing scheme fraud case hearing held in Sindh High Court today (May-19-2020). The court ordered Maxim group to return complete investment of the investors within 6 months, else NAB Karachi will start inquiry against accused.

On the other hand, Directorate of Estate Projects, Air Headquarters, Pakistan Air Force welcome the orders passed today by Honorable High Court of Sindh for commencement of immediate refund to the affectees of Fazaia Housing Scheme, Karachi

Moreover, Sindh High Court has granted bail to two accused persons Tnaveer Ahmed and Bilal Tanveer. They are further directed to quickly return the investment of affectees.

Notably, Tanvir Ahmed and Bilal Tanvir, the top managers of the Maxim Properties, are in custody for cheating the public in the name of the Fazaia Housing Scheme launched as a joint venture with the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) in 2015. According to the prosecution, the suspects kept the location of the project hidden to dodge the general public in the name of the PAF with intention of minting money. It added that they defrauded people for around Rs18 billion in the name of apartments, bungalows, surcharges and processing fees.

On the other hand, according to the statement by Pakistan Air Force SpokesPerson it has been said that

“Directorate of Estate Projects, Air Headquarters, Pakistan Air Force welcomes the orders passed today by Honorable High Court of Sindh for commencement of immediate refund to the affectees of Fazaia Housing Scheme, Karachi as per its insistence and persistent efforts. Throughout the process, the Directorate of Estate Projects, Air Headquarters, PAF has made substantial efforts in securing the interest of Fazaia Housing Scheme, Karachi affectees and would continue to remain involved until the completion of the refund process in the interest of General Public.”

As a matter of fact, the Directorate of Estate Projects is one the directorates of Air Headquarters, Islamabad and its sole mandate is to provide for the welfare of PAF personnel (serving/ retired) along with rehabilitation of war heroes, shuhada families, widows and disabled persons, on non-profit basis. The Directorate does not pursue any schemes for profit or business and only operates for welfare purposes.

Noteworthy, FHSK was a project pursued by the Directorate with the aforesaid mandate in venture with Joint Venture partner, Maxim that was responsible to provide/secure lands for the project. Under the Contract, the Directorate was not allowed to sell or offer any units to the public, other than issue units to its serving personnel on welfare basis, without any provision of profit and all matters pertaining to civil quota members were to be handled by M/s Maxim (JV partner).

However, the wake of Bahria Town Case drew Directorate’s attention towards the inclusion of any state land in FHSK lands. Upon verification of Project Lands carried out at the official request of the Directorate from various government departments in the year 2019, it was identified that the project lands comprised of 194 Acres State and 55 Acres private Lands out of total 370 Acres of Project’s land and afterwards the project was halted.

It is to take note that along with General Public; Directorate is also a complainant in NAB since April, 2019 and in order to facilitate and expedite refunds, the Directorate without any delay submitted its affidavit in January 2020 for  handing over Project Lands, Assets and Funds to NAB to start immediate refund to General Public, even though the responsibility of refunds of the General public was that of Maxim under the Contract.

The following may kindly be noted: –

(a)    The FHSK case is sub judice before the Honorable Sindh High Court.

(b)    Recently, M/s Maxim has submitted its Affidavit in Sindh High Court for refund in which they have agreed to relinquish their rights over Project Funds and Project Assets unconditionally for commencement of refund process.

(c)    They have also given an undertaking that any shortfall in ensuring the complete refunds to General Public and meeting the liabilities of the Project would be realized from sale / auction of Project Assets, advance / profit withdrawn by Maxim and from their own resources.