Billionaire businessman Ashok Doshi who is the director of Doshi Group of Companies faces arrest over a Nairobi land fraud. Doshi is facing arrest together with his wife after he lost a court case in which he sought to permanently ban the police from arresting him.
A petition that had been filed by Doshi and his wife Amit Pratibha was dismissed by the court over lack of merit in the orders it sought.
“In the instant petition, the petitioners are threatened with arrest and arraignment over allegations of fraudulent acquisition of a private property and failure to pay lawful stamp duty, these are not issues which this court can decide,” Justice Eric Ogola said in his ruling.
The couple had told the court that they are the registered owners of the land on Processional Way, Nairobi. This land was originally owned by Greenview Lodge Ltd, which sold it to Magnum Properties Ltd before it was transferred to them in 2018 for Sh. 150 million.
The Doshis further told the court that although Greenview Lodge had sold the land to Magnum Properties Ltd, its director, Jennifer Nthenya had lodged multiple claims that the land had been acquired by the couple illegally, and that stamp duty was not paid.
However, Greenview Lodge told the court that it is the legitimate proprietor of the land. It said that it had been allocated the piece of land by the government in 1986. Greenview, through Ms. Nthenya, told the court that by July 1992, it had paid Sh. 1.05 million towards liquidation of the allocation fees.
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This however stopped when the company lost one of its directors and started looking for a prospective buyer. Greenview then found the Doshis who were willing to buy the land through their firm Magnum Properties Ltd. They agreed that the land would be acquired at Sh. 120 million. This sale did not go through after the Doshis failed to pay up the agreed amount. However, according to Greenview, the Doshis through their property firm obtained a grant over the land. This was in spite of them not being the allottee of the land from the government.