Setback for Saif Ali Khan in ₹15000-crore Pataudi property dispute in Bhopal

Setback for Saif Ali Khan in ₹15000-crore Pataudi property dispute in Bhopal

Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan and his family faced a major setback earlier this week after the Madhya Pradesh high court set aside a 25-year-old order that upheld their right over the property they inherited, worth a whopping ₹15,000 crore, and ordered a fresh trial.

The Pataudi siblings - Saif Ali Khan, Soha Ali Khana, and Saba Ali Khan - along with Kareena Kapoor and Kunal Kemmu pose for a photo. (File)

The judgment and decree passed by a trial court two decades back upheld Saif Ali Khan and his family — mother Sharmila Tagore and sisters Soha Ali Khan and Saba Ali Khan – as the rightful owners of the properties they inherited from the erstwhile rulers of the princely state of Bhopal. However, high court justice Sanjay Dwivedi has now set that order aside and has asked the trial court to conduct a fresh trial and make efforts to settle the case within a year, reported PTI.

The last ruling nawab of Bhopal - Nawab Hamidullah - had three daughters named Abida, Sajida and Rabia. Sajida married Iftikhar Ali Khan Pataudi and become the Nawab Begum of Bhopal. After her elder sister Abida migrated to Pakistan, Sajida inherited their parents’ property, which later went to her son Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi.

Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, also known as Tiger Pataudi, married Bollywood actor Sharmila Tagore and had three children - Saif Ali Khan, Soha Ali Khan and Saba Ali Khan - who inherited the property worth around ₹15,000 crore.

Other heirs of Nawab Hamidullah challenged the inheritance by the Pataudi siblings. Begum Suraiya Rashid and Nawab Mehr Taj Sajida Sultan, along with others had filed suits against ‘unfair’ partition of the property of Nawab Hamidullah. However, according to two separate appeals filed by them, the Bhopal district court ‘unfairly’ dismissed their suit in a judgement dated February 14, 2000.

According to their lawyers, the partition of Nawab Hamidullah's personal property should have been done between them and defendants Saif Ali, Sharmila and 16 other heirs as per the Muslim Personal Law, reported PTI.

The Government of India had issued a certificate on January 10, 1962, in favour of Saif Ali Khan’s grandmother Sajida, naming her the sole successor of all the private properties of the Nawab. The certificate was cited by the Pataudi’s to retain their claim over the wealth. However, the appellants have opposed the citation in their appeal.

The single bench of Justice Sanjay Dwivedi has set the trial court’s decades’ old decree aside and asked it to decide on the matter again. It also directed the court to allow parties to present fresh evidence if required.

Justice Dwivedi said, "The matters are remanded back to the trial court for deciding it afresh."

"And if so required, the trial court can allow the parties to lead further evidence in view of the subsequent development and changed legal position," said his order.

While setting aside the 2000 judgement of the trial court, Justice Dwivedi said that it dismissed the appellants’ suits based on judgement that has been overruled by the Supreme Court.

"I am of the opinion that the trial court, without considering other aspects of the matter, had dismissed the suits, that too relying upon the judgment which has already been overruled by the Supreme Court. Thus, in my opinion, the impugned judgment and decree deserve to be and are hereby set aside," the judge said.

"It is made clear that since the suits were initially filed in 1999, therefore, the trial court shall make all possible efforts to conclude and decide it expeditiously, preferably within a period of one year," he added, reported PTI.

The order also added that the princely state of Bhopal merged with the Union of India after independence on April 30, 1949 under an agreement that read, “The agreement contained a clause revealing that after the merger, all the special rights which the Nawab (Ruler) had, shall remain continued and according to the agreement, it was agreed that all the property which is their personal property, shall be of their absolute ownership and succession of the Gaddi (throne) shall be under the Bhopal Succession to the Throne Act, 1947.”