<p>Central Crime Station officials have moved a petition in a city court seeking permission to question Ali who is currently in judicial remand and under the custody of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in Mumbai for allegedly stashing away $8 billion in foreign banks.<br /><br />The city police have also registered a case under Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972, for allegedly smuggling the Nizam’s artifact. The decision of the court will be known on Friday.<br /><br />In 1994, after the auditing and cataloguing of the artifacts and collection of Salarjung Museum, 635 of the 44,000 valuable artifacts were reportedly missing but over years the CBI succeeded in tracing 347 items. <br /><br />According to a complaint filed at the Mirchowk police station in the old city, most of the missing 237 items were highly prized water colour paintings of several European painters; details of the remaining 51 artifacts have been mentioned as unknown.<br /><br />Police investigators contend that most of the missing antiques “disappeared” during the shifting of the museum from its Deewan Dewdi premises in the old city to its new building at Dabeerpura in 1966. “It was only in the late seventies and eighties that an English inventory was prepared from the existing Urdu inventory “ the police say.<br /><br />As per records, the Culture department of the Government of India had purchased 173 of a total of 245 items, including the Jacob’s diamond, of the Nizam’s Jewellery Trust for Rs 80 crore. The remaining jewels were retained by the last Nizam Mukkaram Jah and their whereabouts are confidential.<br /><br />The police say that Ali had confessed to the ED that he had stashed away precious Nizam artifacts including some jewellery in his accounts at the UBS (Union Bank of Switzerland). Hasan Ali had an innocuous beginning in a middle-class neighbourhood in the Musheerabad area. The youngest of four daughters and two sons of Subhani Nawab, an employee in the state excise department, Hasan Ali is also the grand nephew of Aziz Jung, a noble in the court of the Nizam.<br /><br />Hasan Ali exploited his links with the royal family and married Mehboobunnissa Begum alias Shahinshah, a scion of royal Paigah family. Thereafter Ali, popularly known as “Paigah Khan,” shifted to a bungalow in Banjara Hills, set up a car rental business and floated his Al-Sameer Enterprises in 1979.<br /><br />Khan’s crime career also began with attacks on some neighbours and for submitting fake documents to the SBI Charminar branch for buying cars in 1990. There are at least six cases pending against Khan with the city police; he was arrested in two cheating cases and released on bail.<br /><br />Police said Hasan Ali had allegedly smuggled the antiques abroad between 1990 and 2004. Though the Mumbai police and Enforcement Directorate had sent a dossier on Ali to the Hyderabad police, nothing has happened allegedly due to political pressure.<br /><br /></p>
<p>Central Crime Station officials have moved a petition in a city court seeking permission to question Ali who is currently in judicial remand and under the custody of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in Mumbai for allegedly stashing away $8 billion in foreign banks.<br /><br />The city police have also registered a case under Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972, for allegedly smuggling the Nizam’s artifact. The decision of the court will be known on Friday.<br /><br />In 1994, after the auditing and cataloguing of the artifacts and collection of Salarjung Museum, 635 of the 44,000 valuable artifacts were reportedly missing but over years the CBI succeeded in tracing 347 items. <br /><br />According to a complaint filed at the Mirchowk police station in the old city, most of the missing 237 items were highly prized water colour paintings of several European painters; details of the remaining 51 artifacts have been mentioned as unknown.<br /><br />Police investigators contend that most of the missing antiques “disappeared” during the shifting of the museum from its Deewan Dewdi premises in the old city to its new building at Dabeerpura in 1966. “It was only in the late seventies and eighties that an English inventory was prepared from the existing Urdu inventory “ the police say.<br /><br />As per records, the Culture department of the Government of India had purchased 173 of a total of 245 items, including the Jacob’s diamond, of the Nizam’s Jewellery Trust for Rs 80 crore. The remaining jewels were retained by the last Nizam Mukkaram Jah and their whereabouts are confidential.<br /><br />The police say that Ali had confessed to the ED that he had stashed away precious Nizam artifacts including some jewellery in his accounts at the UBS (Union Bank of Switzerland). Hasan Ali had an innocuous beginning in a middle-class neighbourhood in the Musheerabad area. The youngest of four daughters and two sons of Subhani Nawab, an employee in the state excise department, Hasan Ali is also the grand nephew of Aziz Jung, a noble in the court of the Nizam.<br /><br />Hasan Ali exploited his links with the royal family and married Mehboobunnissa Begum alias Shahinshah, a scion of royal Paigah family. Thereafter Ali, popularly known as “Paigah Khan,” shifted to a bungalow in Banjara Hills, set up a car rental business and floated his Al-Sameer Enterprises in 1979.<br /><br />Khan’s crime career also began with attacks on some neighbours and for submitting fake documents to the SBI Charminar branch for buying cars in 1990. There are at least six cases pending against Khan with the city police; he was arrested in two cheating cases and released on bail.<br /><br />Police said Hasan Ali had allegedly smuggled the antiques abroad between 1990 and 2004. Though the Mumbai police and Enforcement Directorate had sent a dossier on Ali to the Hyderabad police, nothing has happened allegedly due to political pressure.<br /><br /></p>
