Mumbai: The Bombay High Court has cleared the decks for the redevelopment of the Haji Ismail Haji Habib Musafirkhana building in Bhendi Bazar, which also houses flats of fugitive underworld gangster Dawood Ibrahim.
The building will now be redeveloped by the Saifee Burhani Upliftment Trust (SBUT), which will rehabilitate all eligible tenants and shopkeepers, while the flats owned by Ibrahim will be handed over to a special TADA court, which had earlier seized his properties.
This comes after a bench of Justices Satyaranjan Dharmadhikari and Riyaz Chagla upheld the orders of the charity commissioner, who had allowed the sale of the Musafirkhana building to the SBUT.
The sale orders were challenged by the tenants and shopkeepers of the building. They claimed that the building was a Wakf property and could not be sold.
The tenants also challenged the decision of the trust looking after the Musafirkhana building to sell the ground plus two storey structure to the SBUT.
The tenants demanded a stay on the charity commissioner's orders, as these meant the building could be demolished at any time. On the other hand, the building's trust claimed that it had no funds.