Patel family feud over billions in company shares lands in court

The nephew of the late Mombasa philanthropist and business magnate, Hasmukh Kanji Patel, has accused him of defrauding his late father, Arvind Kanji Premji Patel, of shares worth billions of shillings in five companies, including Mombasa Cement.

Khalid Arvind Kanji Patel told Justice Jairus Ngaah that his late father’s signature on transfer deeds, minutes and declarations was forged.

Arvind, who passed away in May 2013, was Hasmukh's elder brother, who died in August 2024 and was celebrated for feeding the poor and paying bills for the sick in hospitals.

Khalid said that his uncle, the late Hasmukh, obtained a grant of probate on January 29, 2014, using a forged will.

Khalid is claiming that his late father’s share in Mombasa Cement Limited, Vishna Holding Limited, Kavee Quarries Limited, Venus Metal Developers Limited and Sunny Construction Company Limited was transferred to Hasmukh through forgery and fraud.

Khalid said that his elder brother Saruj Patel and the directors of the five companies fraudulently registered transfers bearing the forged signature of his late father on the transfer deed, minutes and declaration.

He accused them of registering backdated transfer deeds and failing to pay the beneficiaries their dues.

According to a notice of motion dated December 9, 2025, filed by Khalid, the transferred shares were backdated because his late father lacked the capacity to execute them because he was receiving treatment abroad.

He further alleged that forensic examination by the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) supports these allegations.

In the motion, Khalid has sued his elder brother, Suraj, who is the director of the five listed companies whose shares he claims were stolen and transferred to him.

He also sued the Registrar of Companies alongside the five companies.

Khalid said that he was a personal representative of the estate of his late father, acting under the authority of a limited grant of letters of administration ad litem issued to him on November 19, 2025, by the Chief Magistrate's Court at Mombasa.

Khalid asked the court for ex parte temporary injunctions restraining the five companies from effecting changes to their registers, registering encumbrances, disposing of un-allotted shares and disposing of any assets, including ownership of other companies, machinery, land and bank accounts, pending the inter partes hearing.

He also sought a declaration that the transfer of his late father’ shares in the five companies to his brother Suraj is illegal, fraudulent and void.

Khalid sought orders directing the Registrar of Companies to cancel the transfers and to rectify the registers of the five companies by reinstating to the deceased's estate 27,885, 13,834, 400, 98,000 and 12,000 shares, respectively.

He asked the court to order that the five companies pay the credit due to his late father during the intervening period, with interest at 14 per cent per annum.

He also asked for Kavee Quarries Limited to pay the estate sh12,790,354 and Venus Metal Developers Limited sh719,624 with interest at 14 per cent per annum from May 22, 2013, until payment in full.

Khalid said that his late father neither knew of nor approved the transfers and that his signature on them is a forgery.

“When the transfers were registered, the deceased (Arvind) was critically ill and receiving treatment in India. The transfers lack proper documentation, and the deceased had credit balances with Kavee Quarries Limited and Venus Metal Developers Limited which have not been paid to his estate,” said Khalid.

In his supporting affidavit, Khalid referenced his late father's shareholding in each company by reference to annual returns filed in 2012.

He said that Arvind suffered from ulcerative colitis and underwent major surgery in Mumbai in September 2012 and thereafter a course of chemotherapy.

Khalid said that his late father's brother, Hasmukh, petitioned the court for a grant of probate in September 2013 and applied for its confirmation in September 2014.

He said that the share transfers, although allegedly signed in December 2012, were stamped in February 2013 outside the time allowed by the stamp duty legislation, the instrument bearing the date February 15, 2013.

He further said that no company meetings approved the transfers and that he discovered the alleged fraud in November 2022 upon searching the companies' files at the Business Registration Service and reported the matter to Nyali Police Station.

On their part, Suraj and the five companies filed a preliminary objection seeking the entire suit to be struck out.

The company's lawyer, M/s Daly Inamdar Advocates, said that Justice Ngaah lacks jurisdiction to entertain the incompetent proceedings that were commenced by way of a miscellaneous civil application.

The lawyers said Khalid’s application was unfiled and substantive in nature and ought to have been brought by way of a suit under the Civil Procedure Act and Rules or other applicable law.

“The filing of a plaint within a miscellaneous civil application is self-contradictory and procedurally incompatible, the two modes of commencement being mutually exclusive, and is an abuse of the process of the Court,” said Inamdar.

However, Justice Ngaah said that Khalid’s case is the very antithesis of a clear case that rests on allegations.

The judge said every one of Khalid’s propositions is a contested question of fact, and each will have to be pleaded with particularity, met by a defence, and proved by evidence tested in cross-examination.

He said Khalid’s prayers in the notice of motion were interlocutory, having withdrawn the main suit.

“The prayers in it are not interlocutory in any meaningful sense. They seek a declaration of fraud, the cancellation of share transfers, the rectification of the registers of five companies, and money judgements with interest running from 2013,” said Justice Ngaah.

The judge said that it is a mandatory requirement of the law that any allegation of fraud must be particularised through a plaint and not an affidavit in support of a notice of motion.

While striking out Khalid’s motion, Justice Ngaah said that the dispute genuinely deserves a trial despite not being properly instituted.

The judge said that because the court's jurisdiction over the dispute has not been engaged by competent process, the appropriate order is to strike out the proceedings and not to dismiss them.

“The defect is not a technicality. It is not a wrong heading, a mis-described provision or an irregular form. It is the absence of any proceeding known to the law through which the substantive claims can be tried,” said Justice Ngaah.