Panel rejects enemy property Bill

In a setback to the UPA regime,the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs unanimously rejected the controversial Enemy Property

In a setback to the UPA regime,the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs on Thursday unanimously rejected the controversial Enemy Property Amendment and Validation Second Bill,2010,asking the government to come up with a fresh legislation on the subject.

Refusing to endorse the draft government Bill that would enable legal heirs of those who migrated to Pakistan to hold on to their property in India,the standing committee headed by BJP leader Venkaiah Naidu maintained that the proposed amendment Bill failed to address its objectives.

The committee fails to understand what the government wants to achieve by bringing this second Bill,

said the report submitted to Rajya Sabha Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari. The report added that it strongly feels that enemy properties worth crores of rupees should not go into the hands of those who do not have any legitimate claim over them.

Contending that members of the committee were not convinced by the spirit behind the provisions of the Bill,the report said government representatives who deposed could not explain the reasons as to what necessitated the government to bring the second legislation that was contrary to the objectives of the first Bill.

The committee accordingly recommended that the government may withdraw the present Bill and bring forward a fresh Bill before Parliament incorporating the views and observations of the committee, the report said.

The panel recommended that a time-bound plan be drawn up and the entire process of identification of enemy property and disposal be completed within a stipulated time. It pointed out that Pakistan had long back seized properties of Indians and disposed them of in breach of the mutual agreement.

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The issue came into focus when the government sought to amend the Enemy Property Act,1968,to give more powers to the custodian of enemy properties.

But the matter got stuck after Muslim MPs forced the government to make several changes in the legislation. Among the biggest beneficiaries,should the Bill be approved in its current form,would be the Raja of Mahmoodabad MA Mohammed Khan,who would get control of a large number of properties across Uttar Pradesh. UP has the largest number of enemy properties 1,468,followed by West Bengal 351,Delhi 66 and Gujarat 63.

The report also took note of the opinion of eminent lawyer Ram Jethmalani,who said that when a person is dead,his heir gets what he owned. Even if he is an Indian national and the heir of his father,he gets what the father had,but if the father did not have the property,the property would belong to the Indian nation and he would get zero, the report said.