Islamabad: The National Accountability Bureau has recovered over 1.2 billion rupees and has begun returning the amount to victims of the Bankers City Housing Scheme fraud. To this respect, a ceremony was held in Islamabad today with NAB Chairman Lieutenant General retired Nazir Ahmed in the chair.

According to Radio Pakistan, in the first phase, a total of 341 million rupees was distributed to 476 victims. One hundred and twenty million rupees were handed over to 316 applicants via Payment Orders and 221 million rupees were transferred to 160 applicants through online transactions. The remaining recovered funds will continue to be distributed to the rest of the 2,200 victims in subsequent phases after due verification.

It is pertinent to mention that the Bankers City scandal first emerged in 2006, leading to a formal investigation in 2007 following numerous public complaints. The housing society had been registered with the SECP in 2003 and claimed to possess 14,000 kanals of land across Islamabad, Rawalpindi, and Haripur. However, investigations revealed that the management used misleading advertisements and unverified documentation to collect money from hundreds of citizens.

Through a rigorous and persistent investigation and chronic litigation, NAB successfully recovered a total of 1,209 million rupees from the accused.