Bhopal: 85-yr-old battling for 4 yrs to reclaim house from daughter

Bhopal(Madhya Pradesh): An 85-year-old man has been waging a legal battle for the past four years to reclaim his house from his daughter. The daughter of Ramlal (name changed) got the ownership of his house situated in Old City. She got the property transferred in her name through fraudulent means, as alleged by Ramlal.

Ramlal, who worked as a security guard at a factory in the city, is a widower and lives with families of two of his deceased sons and a widowed daughter. “10 of us live in my 700-sq-foot house,” he said.

According to Ramlal, his elder daughter told him that she wanted to get the registration documents of house in digital form and asked him to sign on a document. “I trusted her and signed as I never thought she would deceive me,” Ramlal told Free Press. Ramlal’s daughter obtained his signatures on a gift deed and used it to get the ownership of the house transferred in her name.

After Ramlal discovered the fraud, he lodged a complaint against his daughter at Mangalwara police station. He later filed a case in the district court. “I have been attending hearings for the past four years. I don’t know whether I will get back my house before I depart from this world,” he said.

Advocate Sarita Rajani, Ramlal’s counsel, said that her client had constructed the house in 1952 with his hard-earned money. Its present value is approximately Rs 40 lakh. “Now that his grandsons know that he is no longer the owner of house, they are reluctant to spend money on him,” Saita said.

According to Rajani, Ramlal’s daughter, who has defrauded him, is financially well-off. “Her husband has retired from a PSU, she owns a big house and all her daughters have good jobs,” she said. “When Baba (Ramlal) last met me, I found him wearing spectacles with help of strings. He didn’t even have the money to repair the damaged spectacles,” Rajani said.