Wakf irregularities: 500 cr worth property at stake

It is alleged that crores of rupees worth property went into the hands of private parties due to the trust members’ misdeeds.

Hyderabad: It has been more than a year since the Hussamuddarain Trust filed an affidavit in Waqf Tribunal, seeking 21 properties in the city managed by trust members to be deleted from the Waqf records. Ironically, the defendant, State Waqf Board, is yet to respond with a counter affidavit, risking loss of Rs 500 crore worth of property.

The trust run by Mutawallis of Sulaimani Community (Shia sect) claimed in the affidavit filed in January 2014 that about two centuries ago their forefathers who settled in the city collected money from among themselves. They had entrusted the collections to elder members in the community with an objective of creating a small corpus to serve as reserves of money to help disadvantaged members. Declaring these as ‘private properties’ acquired from funds contributed by members of the community, the plaintiffs, Ismail Ahmedi, Mohammed Hatim Ziaee and Masood Ali, have asked the tribunal to ‘delete’ the listed properties from Waqf registers.

While most of the properties are situated at Hussaini Alam, the remaining are spread across the city including Mir Alam Road, Bandlaguda village, Bhoiguda, Chapel Road, A C Guards (Saifabad), Abids and Tarnaka. At Kunje Afiyat House (one of the listed property) at MCH No 10-2-9 & 249, Siddi Risala (A C Guard), Saifabad the trust, with the help of a builder, has already constructed huge residential complex on 5833.33 sq yards, under the name ‘Nasr Apartments’ about 15 years ago. Interestingly, the trust alienated two third portion of prime Waqf property to the developer. Transfer of property is against Waqf Act, but only 28 flats of this luxury apartment complex was retained by the Trust, giving away 56 flats to the developer under 40:60 agreement. Moreover, none of the flats were given to poor or the homeless, but were acquired by relatives. These flats cost about Rs 1.2 crore each.

As per the joint report of Task Force Officer Waqf, which was submitted to the Waqf Board chairman on February 4, 2013, it declared the Kunje Afiyat House (currently Nasr Apartments) as a notified Waqf property published in AP Gazette in 1989. The reports also pointed out that several illegal transactions were executed and got registered since 2006. During an enquiry, Inspector Auditor Waqf Circle II, Ahmed Basha, found that the management of the trust had failed to submit budget and income & expenditure details.

Interestingly, the chairman of the Waqf Board who received the report from the Task Force failed to respond. The Board failed to defend the case properly and did not file any affidavit till date. When contacted, the CEO, Waqf Board, Sultan Mohiuddin remained unavailable for his comments.

By: Md Nizamuddin