Jabalpur
The government can take over the property worth Rs 15 thousand crore of Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan’s family. The property of Saif Ali Khan and Sharmila Tagore’s family is spread from Bhopal’s Kohefiza to Chiklod. One and a half lakh people are living on about 100 acres of land of Pataudi family. Actually, the stay on the historical properties of Bhopal state since 2015 has ended.
Madhya Pradesh High Court had ordered actor Saif Ali Khan, his mother Sharmila Tagore, sisters Soha and Sab Ali Khan and Pataudi’s sister Sabiha Sultan to appear before the appellate authority in the enemy property case. Now the period of 30 days of the High Court order to present the case before the appellate authority has ended. Even after the expiry of one month, the Pataudi family has not submitted any claim. The Pataudi family has the option to challenge in the division bench.
Last month, the Jabalpur-based main bench of the High Court had refused to intervene in the enemy property case of Sharmila Tagore, her son Saif Ali Khan and Sabiha Sultan. A single bench of Justice Vivek Aggarwal had given liberty to the Pataudi family to submit an application before the Delhi-based appellate authority in the Custodian of Enemy Property Act case. While disposing of the petition, the single bench had said in its order that the appellate authority should take the decision on merits.
The petition was filed in the year 2015
The Pataudi family had filed a petition in 2015. He had challenged the government’s decision to take control of the properties of the last Nawab of Bhopal under the Enemy Property Act, 1968. In its order, the Custodian of Enemy Property of India (CEPI), Mumbai had declared the Nawab’s properties as enemy property because his elder daughter Princess Abida Sultan had defected to Pakistan in 1950. She (Abida) had gone to Pakistan while the Nawab was alive. After the death of the Nawab, his second daughter Mehr Taj Sajida Sultan Begum was declared heir to the property as per the Bhopal Succession Act, 1947 and the petitioners are her heirs.
