CDA yet to recover billions from two five-star hotels

[Salman]

ISLAMABAD - The Capital Development Authority (CDA) is facing loss of billions of rupees due to non-recovery of land utilisation charges from the two five-star hotels of the federal capital, Serena and Marriott, The Nation has learnt reliably.
According to the documents exclusively available with this scribe, a sum of Rs6.2 billion (Rs6223.67 million) has been pending jointly with the Serena and Marriott hotels since years as the Directorate of Municipal Administration (DMA) of the authority failed to recover the same. The Capital Development Authorit land encroached by the two hotels is being used as parking lots. The issue was first pointed out by the audit department in 2012. Subsequently, a number of meetings were held on the issue in the cabinet division and the Departmental Audit Committee (DAC) repeatedly directed the concerned authorities to recover the same but it went all in vain.
The interest of the authority in recovery of the dues can be gauged from the fact that, in pursuance of the May 2014 directives of the DAC regarding recovery of the land utilisation charges from Marriot and Serena hotels, a meeting of Inter Departmental Committee (IDC) was scheduled for January 6, 2015 but no one from CDA appeared in the said meeting. The cabinet division had constituted the IDC to inquire into the matter.
Furthermore, the sources said, the authority is facing a loss of more than Rs51 million on account of non-taking over possession of plot/petrol pump, Bukhari Filling Station G.T Road Motorway Chowk Islamabad and non-recovery of rent thereof. Loss due to on-removal of illegal construction of madarassahs/mosques and encroachment on Capital Development Authority’s land has been estimated at Rs1131.05 million and the authority is yet to recover the same also.
Different formations/directorates are responsible for the recovery of the said dues but lack of spirit on part of Capital Development Authorit officials is leading to financial loss to the authority.
The interest in recovery of pending dues of other directorates of the authority is no more different. The documents show that the Building Control Section (BCS) of the authority had referred 2139 cases of non-conforming use of the buildings and houses to the Deputy Commissioner Islamabad office for taking appropriate action against them. The DC office disposed of 976 cases where violations were rectified. However, it fined Rs500,000 each to 772 persons for non-conforming use of their property, making it Rs386 million in total.
The sources said that the Capital Development Authority was yet to recover these billions of rupees from the violators as hardly a few have submitted the same. According to the Capital Development Authorit rules, authority was supposed to charge Rs5000/day from each violator in case it did not submit the fine but the Authority did not take any action in this regard.
“The authority is not interested in recovering the actual fine and what to talk about imposing Rs5,000 fine/day on each violator,” a source in the Capital Development Authorit said.