FBR files references against benami properties worth billions of rupees in Islamabad

ISLAMABAD: The Anti Benami Zone of the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has filed 12 references before the Adjudicating Authority for owning 3,134 kanals of land having value of billions of rupees, reported The News on Thursday.

There are 12 benamidars, but the beneficial owner is one person in this whole case, said the report. Earlier, in case of disputes, people went to courts for litigation, but after enactment of the Benami Law, there is another forum available to provide such crucial information.

In this case, a dispute occurred and the complainant provided insider information to the FBR’s Benami Zone that resulted into framing of 12 references before the Adjudicating Authority, the publication claimed.

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According to the details available with The News, the FBR’s Anti Benami Zone, Islamabad, unearthed this mega scam of possessing benami properties of over 3,000 kanals of Rs2 billion worth.

The authorities attached all the properties/ assets and framed the case against the actual beneficial owner and subsequently filed the reference with the Adjudicating Authority.

The tax machinery has detected an organized racket allegedly involving investors of housing societies and their frontmen involved in benami transactions to the tune of billions of rupees.

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Most of the benamidars have admitted before the FBR investigators that they were not aware of ownership of such land as they had never purchased any such land.

However, the FBR’s Anti Benami Zone verified the information from the concerned deputy commissioner of land record office about the purchaser and sellers of the involved properties.

The reference-statement of case and references had been filed under Section 22(5) of the Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Act, 2017. The actual beneficial owner of all these benami properties is only one person i.e. accused Tauseef Ahmed, a resident of Islamabad.

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The different benamidars have purchased 363 kanal land, 208 kanal land, 231 kanal land, 279 kanal land, 120 kanal land, 100 kanal land, 185 kanal land, 74 kanal land, 99 kanal land, 1160 kanal land, 215 kanal land, and 100 kanal land. 

The land is located near the New Airport, Islamabad, at the Chakri Road and 12 different benamidars were shown to have purchased the land in their names, but the actual owner is the said person.

So far, a total of 34 references have been filed with the relevant adjudicating authority, including the 12 new cases. 

The total assets attached were 140 and under investigation benamidars were 727 and assets worth Rs30.5 billion had been attached.

The worth of references filed totals 14 billion rupees in 34 references. The information received from district level about the benami land revealed that the 28,600 Kanals have estimated value of Rs72 billion.

Originally published in The News