Loss of inheritance: Enemy Property

Enemy property bill on hold, squatters can have field day

Vishwa Mohan TNN
New Delhi: Days after getting Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on board to keep the Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill in abeyance, a delegation of prominent Muslim MPs on Monday met Union home minister P Chidambaram over the proposed legislation even as there is serious discussion in the government on getting the bill passed with some modifications, which will allow the authorities to keep encroachers and land mafia away from immovable properties worth thousands of crores and protect the rights of legal heirs.
Those who met Chidambaram include Union ministers Salman Khurshid, Farooq Abdullah and E Ahmed, as well as Congress MP Mohammed Azharuddin. Minister of state for home affairs Ajay Maken was also present.
Sources said moves were afoot to bring in certain amendments to the bill before it’s passed in Parliament during the Monsoon session itself — so as not to let the ordinance lapse on August 28.
The amendments are likely to be brought in such a way that the government would have power in the new law to weed out encroachers. Some of the provisions, which give power to the custodian to evict unauthorized occupation, would be there in the bill, so that it do not adversely affect the powers of the government in weeding out encroachers, said sources.
Currently, there are 2,186 enemy properties with Uttar Pradesh having the maximum 1,468 properties followed by West Bengal (351), Delhi (66), Gujarat (63), Bihar (40), Goa (35), Madhya Pradesh (29) and Maharashtra (25). These are the properties, which were left by those who migrated to Pakistan, Bangladesh and China without having any legal heir.
Though most of these properties have been in custody of the government ever since the law under the Enemy Property Act, 1968 came into force, a number of people claiming to be legal heirs or claiming to have been gifted through oral or unregistered wills approached the courts. Subsequently, the High Courts and Supreme Court came out with orders, making such heirs the sole claimants of these properties worth several thousands of crores of rupees across the country.
These court judgments had prompted the government to come out with an ordinance so that such properties do not go to someone whose claims did not appear to be correct as in some of the cases it was suspected that the claimants had allegedly bought the ‘will’ or ‘unregistered gift orders’ from those Pakistani or Bangladeshi nationals who had left these properties in India. Some of them had even allegedly managed to come out with adoptions certificates so that they can claim their rights over such valuable properties.
The President had promulgated an ordinance on July 2 in the backdrop of these High Courts and Supreme Court orders. The bill to replace the ordinance amending an Act of 1968 was introduced by the Union minister of state for home affairs Ajay Maken in the Lok Sabha on August 2. It was subsequently listed for consideration and passing two days later.
But, it was deferred reportedly when the PM intervened following his meeting with a delegation of prominent Muslim MPs. They reportedly requested Singh to examine the bill as it would have a politically adverse impact on a large number of families in several states....http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Repository/ml.asp?Ref=Q0FQLzIwMTAvMDgvMTAjQXIwMTcwMQ==&Mode=Gif&Locale=english-skin-custom