LAHORE: A major corruption scandal has surfaced in the Lahore Development Authority (LDA), where several buildings in Johar Town were allegedly granted commercial status years before the roads were legally notified as commercial routes.
Officials in the Town Planning Wing said the irregularities appear far more widespread and may extend to major corridors including Garden Town, Canal Bank Road, Gulberg, Defence Road, Pine Avenue and Raiwind Road. They warned that a full forensic audit could reveal similar cases across the city’s busiest commercial hubs.
Under LDA rules, commercialisation fees must be charged on designated commercial roads according to prescribed valuation rates. However, multiple properties were reportedly declared commercial while the roads were still categorised as List B, where commercialisation is prohibited. This allowed owners to pay much lower fees based on older DC rates, leading to substantial financial losses for the authority and validating illegal constructions.
Minutes of a recent authority meeting confirm that several plots in MA Johar Town were commercialised long before the roads received List A status. In one case, a commercial letter dated January 8, 2015 was issued for properties located on Bypass Road at a time when the road was a List B route. It was officially upgraded to List A only in April 2022 — seven years later.
A similar case was noted on Khayaban-e-Firdousi Road, where a commercialisation letter was approved on January 8, 2015 despite the road being frozen as a List B category at the time.
The authority has now decided to apply current valuation table rates for commercialisation of properties located on List A roads, adjusting previously deposited amounts in line with the LDA Land Use Rules 2020. The Chief Town Planner has been instructed to initiate disciplinary proceedings against officials responsible for approving the earlier cases.
LDA Director General Tahir Farooq said a special committee has been formed to investigate the matter. He added that a forensic audit of selected commercial hubs would be conducted to identify further cases and assured that action would be taken against those involved.
