Traders perform 'yajna' to delay eviction from ex-enemy property

Lucknow, Aug 30 (UNI) The eviction of traders from the property of Raja Mehmoodabad is certain, but still the traders at upmarket Hazratganj are performing a 'yajna', since Monday, to stave off the inevitable amid hope that the Raja would eventually decide against ousting them.

The Raja won a prolonged legal battle last year after the Supreme Court agreed to delist his father's property spread across Lucknow, Sitapur, Lakhimpur Kheri and Nainital (Uttranchal) as 'enemy property'.

The district administration here said while August 31 is the deadline for traders to vacate the property, it would give tenants ''some more time'' to enable them move the SC again. The Lucknow bench of Allahabad High Court had refused to review the order of the apex court a couple of days ago.

The 'insaf mahayajna' is being attended by traders and tenants of all religions. While shops were closed for two days, they re-opened today.

Mohd Khan, the only son of Mohd Amir Ahmed Khan, last ruler of Mahmoodabad, will get back a fort and other properties owned by his father.

The government had confiscated the properties after Mr Khan's father migrated to Pakistan shortly after Partition. However, his wife and son Mohd had stayed back in India.

In 1965, when India and Pakistan went to war, the ruler's assets in Uttar Pradesh were declared enemy property and seized by the government. Khan, a Cambridge graduate, began fighting the case after his father's death in 1973.

In October last year, the SC upheld a lower court decision that the citizenship of Mohd Khan, the legal heir, was not in question and the land could not be termed enemy property.

The restored assets include a fort, dozens of buildings, hundreds of acres of farm land and a hotel in Nainital.

The apex court has also ordered the government to pay Rs 5 lakh to Khan for having retained the property illegally and to help him cover some of his legal costs.

UNI NAB VS VD HT1612