
BHOPAL: While Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan was discharged from Mumbai’s Lilavati Hospital on Tuesday, five days after being admitted following a near-fatal stab attack at his home, clouds of uncertainty hover over the fate of the Rs 15,000 crore property reportedly belonging to his family in the Madhya Pradesh capital, Bhopal.
A single-judge bench of the MP High Court in Jabalpur disposed of the petition filed by Saif Ali Khan in 2015 against the 2014 government notice declaring the Pataudi family’s property in Bhopal as ‘enemy property.’
Furthermore, in its order on December 13, 2024, the High Court granted the Pataudi family 30 days to approach the appellate authority to reclaim the property.
However, with none of the Pataudi family members, including Saif Ali Khan or his mother, Sharmila Tagore (Pataudi), having approached the appellate tribunal within the 30-day deadline stipulated by the High Court, the Bhopal district administration may now exercise its full rights over the properties, which span a large area of Bhopal, from Kohe Fiza to Chiklod.
As the Pataudi family did not approach the appellate authority within the 30-day period specified in the High Court's order, the Bhopal district administration could initiate the process of taking over the properties at any time.
The family of multiple Bollywood actors, however, still has the option of moving the matter before a division bench of the MP High Court.
When contacted on Tuesday, Bhopal District Collector Kaushalendra Vikram Singh said, “We will examine the entire matter, and after consulting with legal experts, we will proceed appropriately. We will study the High Court order and act in accordance with the relevant law.”
Importantly, in 2014, the Office of the Custodian of Enemy Property for India in Mumbai issued a notice declaring the Pataudi family’s properties in Bhopal as “enemy property.”
Later, in 2016, an ordinance by the central government clarified that heirs would have no rights over the concerned enemy properties.
Saif Ali Khan challenged the 2014 notice in the Madhya Pradesh High Court’s principal bench in Jabalpur in 2015 and obtained a stay. However, a decade later, on December 13, 2024, the High Court’s single-judge bench disposed of the petition, consequently vacating the stay.
After the death of Bhopal’s Nawab Hamidullah Khan in 1960, his eldest daughter, Abida Sultan, was considered the heir to the property. However, as she had moved to Pakistan in 1950, the central government declared her second daughter, Sajida Sultan, as the heir to the property.
Sajida, the Nawab Begum of Bhopal, was married to Nawab Iftikhar Ali Khan Pataudi, the Nawab of Pataudi (Haryana). Saif Ali Khan reportedly inherited the property, along with the title of Nawab of Bhopal, following the death of his father, Nawab Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, the last Nawab of Pataudi, in September 2011. Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi was the son of Nawab Iftikhar Ali Khan Pataudi and Sajida Sultan.