How the fraud was uncovered

WHILE serving on administrative posts in Punjab, I invariably came across persons who tried to seek undue benefits by hook or by crook. About 23 years ago, I was serving as the managing officer (rehabilitation) under the Displaced Persons (Compensation & Rehabilitation) Act, 1954. Claims regarding property/land left in Pakistan by displaced persons were being filed even five decades after the Partition. Most of these petitions were half-baked and often concealed facts and circumstances. A case filed in 1998 by two residents of a newly created district of Punjab during my predecessor’s tenure came up for hearing before me in 2000. The petition claimed that at the time of the Partition, a Hindu mahant had left behind 1,100 ghumaon (acres) of land in a village of Pakistan’s Montgomery district. He had migrated from Pakistan and had no natural heir, it was claimed. He had been living with the petitioners for the past 12 years and had executed a registered will in November 1997 in their favour before passing away in March 1998. Being legal heirs as per the will, the petitioners were seeking compensation through the allotment of land. A copy of the revenue record of the village concerned and copies of the will and the death certificate were appended with the petition.

Prima facie, it struck me that a man who had 1,100 acres in Pakistan had not filed a claim with the authorities even though he had been alive till 1998. Why had the petitioners woken up now, even though they were not even blood relations of the deceased? I asked the petitioners’ counsel to call them on the next date so that their statements could be recorded. Subsequently, one of the petitioners got his statement recorded. He informed us about the death of the other petitioner and promised to bring the latter’s legal heirs. When I asked him about any house/property owned by the mahant or any entry of his name in a voter list or ration card in Punjab or elsewhere in India, he became evasive. He left my office in a huff, promising to bring this information on the next date of hearing.

I, along with a retired officer proficient in Urdu, visited the office of the Director, Land Records, Punjab, to examine the revenue record received from Pakistan. We traced the jamabandi of the village concerned and found that the copy attached with the petition was doctored. We also found a letter written by a tehsildar of Montgomery district in July 1954. It stated that during the Partition, the mahant had not left Pakistan; he had converted to Islam and married a Muslim woman, from whom he had a son. The letter mentioned that he had died around 1952 in his native village.

With these conclusive findings, it became clear that the mahant had never migrated to India. Both the will and the death certificate were fake. The petition was dismissed with the contempt it deserved and a recommendation was sent to the government for getting a case registered against the guilty persons.