Mohammed Rafi's son Shahid in danger losing family home in Bandra

Sunil Baghel (MUMBAI MIRROR; October 12, 2019)
Almost 40 years after Mohammed Rafi’s death, his youngest son Shahid Rafi is fighting a legal battle to retain the family home – Rafi Mansion – that the legendary singer built on Bandra’s 28th Road in the 1970s. HDFC Bank had filed a petition in the court seeking possession of Shahid’s fifth floor flat in the building, which came up in the 1980s after the bungalow in which Rafi resided was razed.
The bank has claimed that Shahid inked a deal with a company, Nimbus Industries Limited, to sell the flat, and the company took a Rs 4.16-crore loan from the bank to purchase the property. After Nimbus defaulted on repayment, the bank moved the court claiming the property.
Shahid said that the flat is worth at least Rs 5 crore, even in today’s weak economic climate. He argued that he never intended to sell the property to Nimbus, and that he had entered into an agreement with the company in November 2017 in lieu of a loan for a “short period” after he suffered losses in business. He further said that he did not receive the entire amount promised to him by the company, hence the agreement wasn’t executed. Moreover, the agreement wasn’t registered with the authorities, hence it cannot be binding, he argued.
While the high court refused to grant relief to Shahid citing that the fact that a cancellation deed was executed, which meant that the sale did take place, he received a glimmer of hope at the Debt Recovery Tribunal, which granted stay in his favour on Thursday.
Shahid, who approached the tribunal after the high court allowed him to take appropriate proceedings, said that this is the sole house in his name. In the suit he filed in the high court, he said, “The flat has memories and sentiments attached thereto since Mohammed Rafi once lived in the bungalow standing in place of the existing building.”
In the Debt Recovery Tribunal where he is represented by advocates Hiren Pandya and Trupti Kapadia, he said that the agreement with Nimbus was being signed “only for finance purposes for a short term” and that he never had any plan to sell the flat. He said that he received Rs 1.95 crore, though the agreement records payment of Rs 3.16 crore. “I was asked not to deposit the cheques by Nimbus’s director,” he claimed.
Advocate Firoz Bharucha, representing HDFC Bank in the high court, said that the agreement between Shahid and Nimbus had concluded, giving the bank all the rights to attach the property.