MARIA ANGELICA FERNANDES THR POA RITESH VISHWANATH RIVONKARversusTHE CUSTODIAN OF ENEMY PROPERTY FOR INDIA AND 2 ORS

                                              903-WP-45-2026.DOC
2026:BHC-GOA:1901-DB




                Suchitra

                             IN THE HIGH COURT OF BOMBAY AT GOA

                                       WRIT PETITION NO.45/2026

                 MARIA ANGELICA FERNANDES THR
                 POA RITESH VISHWANATH
                 RIVONKAR                                            … PETITIONER

                           Versus

                 1. THE CUSTODIAN OF ENEMY
                 PROPERTY FOR INDIA, Department of
                 Commerce, Ministry of Commerce and
                 Industry, Government of India, Kaiser - 1
                 Hind Building, Currimbhoy Road, Ballard
                 Estate, Mumbai - 400 038.

                 2. THE COLLECTOR, Oice of the
                 Collector, North Goa District, Collectorate
                 Building, Panaji, Goa – 403 001.

                 3. THE MAMLATDAR OF TISWADI,
                 Oice of the Mamlatdar, Tiswadi Taluka,
                 Collectorate Building, Opp. Municipal
                 Garden, Panaji, Goa - 403 001.                      … RESPONDENTS

                 Mr Ajay Menon and Ms M. Simoes, Advocates for the Petitioner.

                 Mr R. Chodankar, Central Government Standing Counsel for
                 Respondent No.1.

                                     CORAM:            VALMIKI MENEZES &
                                                       AMIT S. JAMSANDEKAR, JJ.

                                     DATED:            23rd SEPTEMBER 2026

                 ORAL JUDGMENT : (Per Valmiki Menezes, J.)


                1.         Heard Mr Ajay Menon for the Petitioner and Mr R.
                Chodankar,          Central   Government       Standing   Counsel   for
                Respondent No.1.


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2.     Rule. Rule is made returnable forthwith at the request of
and with the consent of the learned counsel for the parties.

3.     he main challenge in this Petition is to the orders dated
08.12.2004 and certiicate of the same date issued by the
Custodian of the Enemy Property, purporting to have been issued
in exercise of jurisdiction under Section 8 and Section 12 of the
Enemy Property Act, 1968 (said Act).             Further challenge is
thrown to the notice dated 05.08.2025, issued by the Mamlatdar
of Tiswadi, scheduling an inspection of the Petitioner’s property
under Survey No.414/6 of Village Calapor on the basis that the
same has been declared to be an enemy property under the said
Act.

4.     According to the Petitioner’s case, she purchased the
property under Survey No.414/6 of Village Calapor, admeasuring
211 sq.mtrs., by Sale Deed of 24.01.1970. At the relevant time,
since the land was not surveyed in terms of the Goa Land
Revenue Code which came into force a year later, the property
was described in the said Sale Deed as 1/6th of the property
inscribed in the Taluka Revenue Oice of Ilhas, under Number
One Hundred Sixty Seven. However, subsequently, when the
new surveys were conducted, it was allotted Survey No.414/6 of
Village Calapor with an area of 211 sq.mtrs. Mutation in Survey
Records has taken place in the year 1994, in favour of the
Petitioner.

5.     It is further the Petitioner’s case that she received a notice
dated 30.07.1996 under the Act informing her that a property by

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the name of 20, Bairre, St. Cruz, Plot No.167, area 211 sq.mtrs.
which was purportedly the Petitioner’s Plot, belonged to an
enemy since it was originally owned by one Deodita Cursina
Antonia Rego Correia alias Cursina Rego, who was, according to
the notice, a Pakistani National.      he Petitioner further has
averred that by reply of 14.08.1996, the Respondent No.1 was
informed that the property was purchased by the aforementioned
sale deed from one Deodita Cursina Antonia Rego Correia alias
Cursina Rego; the fact that the said Deodita Cursina Antonia
Rego Correia alias Cursina Rego was a Pakistani National has
been disputed/denied by the Petitioner. he Petitioner avers that
pursuant to this notice, the impugned orders dated 08.12.2004
were issued, though according to the Petitioner, the same were
never communicated to the Petitioner and she has gained
knowledge about the impugned orders only when she received
notice of the Mamlatdar and made further inquiries under the
Right to Information Act; the Petitioner was thereafter furnished
the impugned orders dated 08.12.2004 on 10.11.2025, after
which the present Petition was iled.

6.    Mr Chodankar, on behalf of the Respondent No.1, submits
that the Petitioner has an alternate and equally eicacious remedy
of an appeal under Section 18 of the Act. He relies upon an order
dated 13.12.2024 of the High Court of Madhya Pradesh at
Jabalpur passed in the case of Saif Ali Khan Pataudi v/s. Union of
India – Writ Petition No.4980/2015 with connected Petitions
and an order dated 13.11.2025 passed by the Division Bench of
this Court in Pramila Digambar Naik and others v/s. Union of

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India and others – Writ Petition No.1026/2024 (F) in support of
his submission.

7.    he Custodian of Enemy Property has not iled any
aidavit in reply but instead a counter reply has been iled by one
Kamaljit A. Kamal, Deputy Secretary in the oice of the
Custodian of Enemy Property. here is no supporting aidavit to
this reply. his reply in substance claims that the property is an
enemy property but however, there is no categorical statement
made anywhere therein on the basis of any documentation from
any inquiry conducted by the authority that the Vendor of the
property i.e. Deodita Cursina Antonia Rego Correia alias Cursina
Rego was a Pakistani National. here is no aidavit also sworn to
substantiate this contention nor any document produced to
substantiate this stand. he only document appended to the
reply is a truncated copy of the schedule (the entire document is
not annexed) where the name of one Deodita Cursina Antonia
Rego Correia alias Cursina Rego is seen at Serial No.82 in relation
to a property situated at Arpora, a location quite diferent from
that of the Petitioner’s property which is village Calapor.
However, none of these documents establish that the Vendor
named in the Petitioner’s deed of sale was a Pakistani National.

8.    Under Section 2(b) of the Act, ‘enemy’ has been deined as
under:-

      “    2(b) - "enemy" or "enemy subject" or "enemy irm"
      means a person or country who or which was an enemy, an
      enemy subject including his legal heir and successor

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whether or not a citizen of India or the citizen of a country
which is not an enemy or the enemy, enemy subject or his
legal heir and successor who has changed his nationality] or
[an enemy irm, including its succeeding irm whether or
not partners or members of such succeeding irm are citizen
of India or the citizen of a country which is not an enemy
or such irm which has changed its nationality], as the case
may be, under the Defence of India Act, 1962, and the
Defence of India Rules, 1962 for the Defence of India Act,
1971 (42 of 1971) and the Defence of India Rules, 1971],
but does not include a citizen of India other than those
citizens of India, being the legal heir and successor of the
"enemy" or "enemy subject" or "enemy irm"];

[Explanation 1. For the purposes of this clause, the
expression "does not include a citizen of India" shall
exclude and shall always be deemed to have been excluded
those citizens of India, who are or have been the legal heir
and successor of an "enemy" or an "enemy subject" or an
"enemy irm" which or who has ceased to be an enemy due
to death, extinction, winding up of business or change of
nationality or that the legal heir and successor is a citizen of
India or the citizen of a country which is not an enemy.

Explanation 2. - For the purposes of this clause, it is hereby
clariied that nothing contained in this Act shall afect any
right of the legal heir and successor referred to in this clause
(not being inconsistent to the provisions of this Act) which


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      have been conferred upon him under any other law for the
      time being in force;]”

9.    Section 5 of the Act vests an enemy property in the
Custodian while Section 11 empowers the Custodian, for the
purpose of conducting inquiries into the status of a person as an
enemy or any particular property that is suspected to be enemy
property, to issue notices calling upon persons to furnish
information in that regard. he Custodian has in fact issued a
notice dated 30.07.1996 to the Petitioner under the provisions of
Section 11 of the Act to which a reply was iled. However, from
the record we notice that there is no speciic inding or order
given by the Custodian that the Vendor of the Petitioner’s
property was a Pakistani National or that the property was
declared to be an enemy property after holding an inquiry and
hearing the Petitioner. here is no such decision or material
produced before us declaring the said Deodita Cursina Antonia
Rego Correia alias Cursina Rego, the Vendor in the sale deed, to
be a Pakistani National or the property to be an enemy property,
after hearing the Petitioner. If this be so, the impugned orders
dated 08.12.2004, both under Sections 8 and 12 of the Act,
would be wholly without jurisdiction since the prerequisite for
exercising jurisdiction under these provisions and for the
Custodian to claim the property vests in it would require a
declaration that the Vendor of the Petitioner’s property was an
‘enemy’ as deined under Section 2(b) of the Act.

10.   We therefore declare the orders dated 08.12.2004 under
Sections 8 and 12 of the Act to be without jurisdiction and
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                                  consequently we quash and set aside the same. All subsequent
                                  communications, notices or orders, which follow the impugned
                                  orders would necessarily have also to be declared to be a nullity as
                                  they are based upon the impugned orders dated 08.12.2004. In
                                  these circumstances, when the challenge to the order is on the
                                  premise that the same was passed without jurisdiction under the
                                  Act, in our opinion, relegating the Petitioner to an alternate
                                  remedy of appeal would be unfair, since the impugned orders
                                  themselves are without any jurisdiction. he impugned orders
                                  being without jurisdiction, would be therefore be amenable to
                                  writ jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India,
                                  and no purpose will be served to relegate the Petitioner to a
                                  remedy of appeal.

                                  11.   We therefore make Rule absolute in terms of prayer clauses
                                  (a), (b) and (c) of the Petition. As a consequence of Rule being
                                  made absolute, since the name of the Custodian of Enemy
                                  Property is now recorded in the Occupant’s Column of the land
                                  under Survey No.414/6 of Village Calapor, we direct that the
                                  Revenue Authorities i.e. the Mamlatdar, Tiswadi Taluka/Collector
                                  of North Goa delete the entry and restore the entry of the
                                  Petitioner’s name as it originally stood in the survey record under
                                  Form I and XIV in land under Survey No.414/6, Village Calapor.


                                   AMIT S. JAMSANDEKAR, J.                 VALMIKI MENEZES, J.




Signed by: SUCHITRA NANDAN                                        Page 7 of 7
SINGBAL                                                     23rd September 2026
Designation: Personal Assistant
Date: 24/09/2026 14:34:43