The Capital Development Authority (CDA) has been very active recently in its drive against illegal housing projects and encroachments. CDA’s Enforcement Wing, in its action against illegal practices in private housing societies, has decided to seal the offices of four main housing societies. The step to seal the offices is taken as a result of multiple legal non-compliances, such as layout plan violations, illegal development, and prohibited land use.
Societies Effected
CDA's sealing letters, written by the Housing Directorate of the Planning Wing was after multiple notices to the concerned societies had been issued, to which no response was given. These four housing societies are:
- Soan Garden
- Bahria Town
- Jinnah Garden
- Accounts Group Officers Cooperative Housing Society (AGOCHS)
Non-Compliance of Each Society
All four societies are involved in some sort of illegal development; however, for each, the degree and type are different. The details are given below:
- Soan Garden has been accused of illegal conversion of land for parks, graveyards, and public buildings and carrying out development works on 585 kanals without an approved layout plan or NOC.
- The CDA has claimed that Bahria Town did not fulfill the conditions it had set for the approval of its Phase-III E and IV scheme in 2010. Other phases too have allegedly seen violations of land marked out for parks, a graveyard and public buildings.
- CDA has canceled the layout plan of Housing Scheme-I of AGOCHS. The society has been accused of illegal conversion of sites meant for public amenities.
- The Jinnah Garden developed by the Federal Employees Cooperative Housing Society (FECHS) has also been accused of similar charges, including conversion of amenity land and non-implementation of compliance issues regarding its layout plan.
Reason Leading to Sealing of Offices
“After issuing show-cause and final notices to each society, the authority plans to go ahead with sealing the offices,” said a senior CDA officer. The move forms part of a wider wave of enforcement that CDA has ramped up during the year 2026, which has already seen a crackdown on illegal schemes in Zone IV in May, and separately, action against Federal Employees Housing offices for unpaid dues of over PKR 57 million.
Implications for General Public
- The sealing of the offices may affect day-to-day services such as transfers, allotments and NDC issuance, at least for the time being.
- It indicates a longstanding legal uncertainty in some sectors or phases of these societies, particularly on land originally designated for parks or public buildings.
- One should check the exact legal status of a plot directly from CDA independently before making any payment and not depend on the overall brand image of a society.
The step to seal the offices of four known private housing societies comes under the broader CDA effort to bring housing projects under a legal umbrella and to reduce encroachment and illegal development.