Dawood Ibrahim's properties in Maha's Ratnagiri auctioned for Rs 23L

Dawood Ibrahim's properties auctioned virtually. Pics/Suresh Karkera

The competent authority of the Smugglers and Foreign Exchange Manipulators (Forfeiture of Property) Act (SAFEMA) on Tuesday auctioned six properties of underworld don Dawood Ibrahim in his ancestral village in Ratnagiri district in Maharashtra for nearly Rs 23 lakh.

SAFEMA had put on auction seven properties belonging to Dawood Ibrahim and one property of Dawood's aide Iqbal Mirchi.

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The successful bidders include lawyer Ajay Shrivastava and Supreme Court advocate Bhupendra Bhardwaj in the scheduled online, offline and sealed tender auction held.

"We got excellent response for the auction. The six properties at Ratnagiri have been successfully sold. Four bids were won by Bhardwaj and two others by Shrivastava," a beaming Additional Commissioner, SAFEMA, R.N. D'Souza told media persons post-auction.

According to D'Souza, the bids for two of the properties on the block went much above their reserve prices - Rs 1.89 lakh (sold at Rs 5.35 lakh), and Rs 4.30 lakh (sold for Rs 11.20 lakh) - while the other properties went for the base prices.

One property of the fugitive don originally scheduled to be auctioned, was withdrawn owing to certain technicalities, he added.

The virtual auction started at 10 am and went on till 12 noon. Out of seven properties of Dawood Ibrahim, one could not be auctioned due to technical glitches.

Explaining the procedure, D'Souza said that 25 percent of the bid amount must be deposited within a week, another 25 percent within a month, and the balance within one to three months.

After the complete payment is made, the buyer would be issued a confirmation letter by the SAFEMA finalising the deal.

A majority of the properties are mostly small constructions - some in a bad shape - on plots of land, situated in Mumbake village in Khed sub-district of Ratnagiri, from where the Kaskar family hailed.

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The competent authority under SAFEMA had planned to auction off all 13 seized properties of the fugitive don early this year, but the plans were postponed in view of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent lockdown.

Meanwhile, Iqbal Mirchi's property, located in Santacruz, could not be sold as there was not even a single bidding for it.

In April 2019, the SAFEMA had auctioned a 600 square feet flat at Gordon Hall Apartments in Nagpada owned by the don's deceased sister Haseena Parkar for Rs 1.80 crore.

After her death in 2014, it was occupied by her brother Iqbal Kaskar, who was arrested by Thane police in 2017 in several extortion cases and is currently in prison.

In 2018, the SAFEMA auctioned another of Dawood's property in Amina Mansion in south Mumbai which was picked up by the Saifee Burhani Upliftment Trust (SBUT) for Rs 3.51 crore against the reserve price of Rs 79.50 lakh.

Prior to this in November 2017, the SAFEMA had sold, by auction, six flats in south Mumbai, the Shabnam Guest House and the Raunaq Afroz Restaurant for a total of over Rs 11.50 crore.

(With inputs from agency)

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