Centre allows states to put enemy properties exclusively to ‘public use’

Centre allows states to put enemy properties exclusively to ‘public use’

The Centre has allowed state governments to put to “public use” some enemy properties that were left behind by people who migrated to Pakistan since the Partition and to China after the 1962 Sino-Indian war.

The move comes amid the central government’s efforts to sell more than 9400 enemy properties, worth over Rs 1 trillion, and Rs 3000 crore worth of enemy shares.

Enemy Property

• As per the Enemy Property Act , 1968, ‘enemy property’ refers to property that was belonging to a person who migrated from India to an enemy country when a war broke out.
• After the war with China and Pakistan in 1962 and 1965, the government took over the properties, under the Defense of India Act, from persons who migrated to these countries.
• The confiscated property included both movable and immovable properties such as securities, jewellery, land and buildings.
• Later, in 1968, a law called the Enemy Property Act was enacted to regulate such properties and entrusted with the Custodian of Enemy Property (CEPI).

Why in news?

⏩The guidelines for disposal of the Enemy Property Order, 2018, have been amended to facilitate “usages of enemy property by the state government exclusively for public use”.

⏩Of the total properties left behind by those who took Pakistani citizenship, 4991 are located in Uttar Pradesh, the highest in the country. West Bengal has 2735 such estates and Delhi 487.

⏩The highest number of properties left by Chinese nationals in Meghalaya (57). West Bengal has 29 such properties and Assam seven.