• News
  • India News
  • Gangster Abu Salem writes to Azamgarh police, seeks help to save ancestral land
This story is from March 13, 2018

Gangster Abu Salem writes to Azamgarh police, seeks help to save ancestral land

Gangster Abu Salem writes to Azamgarh police, seeks help to save ancestral land
LUCKNOW: Expressing faith in the law, 60-year-old Abu Salem approached Azamgarh police, his native town to help resolve a property dispute. Convicted under terror charges Salem who is lodged in Taloja prison in Navi Mumbai posted a registered letter to Saraimeer police station from the prison.
While accessing the mails on Monday afternoon, Saraimeer’s station house officer Ram Naresh Yadav came across Salem’s complaint.
“The letter bore a jail stamp and Salem’s name in the end. Salem is involved in a land dispute with some people and wants us to intervene,” said Yadav over the phone.
Reposing trust in the government machinery, the gangster named six persons from his native village Pathan Tola in the complaint holding them accused of encroaching upon his ancestral land.
Sharing details of the land chunks owned by his family, Salem appealed to the police to get 160 hectares free of unauthorised construction. However, police say that major portion of the land at the centre of a dispute has remained inhabited for decades and at least 50 families including that of Salem built houses, shops, complexes on it.
“Salem’s brother Abu Hakim is constructing a three-storey shopping mall on the same land and wants adjacent land parcel as well,” said Yadav explaining what prompted Salem to approach authorities. Salem alleged that six persons who have been staying in the same neighbourhood have colluded with the revenue department officials in order to get land mutation records changed.
Earlier too Salem’s family members including his brother-in-law, an advocate appealed to the local authorities urging them to resolve the dispute. Salem’s nephew and Hakim’s son Arif said that some people squatted on the land several years ago and were allowed to stay for humanity sake. “And now they are claiming ownership,” he added.

DIG Azamgarh range Vijay Bhusan said that the complaint along with a recommendation to hold an inquiry would be forwarded to the district magistrate. “The matter will be decided by revenue department after examining land records,” added Bhusan.
Nizamabad sub-divisional magistrate B Shukla, however, said that matter was inquired earlier too and records produced by Salem’s family and his neighbours were examined. “The land chunks were measured but no anomaly was detected. We will go through the fresh complaint and take action if new facts come to light,” said Shukla.
End of Article
FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA