Radisson Edwardian Hotels founder in court battle with father
Multi millionaire hotel tycoon, Jasminder Singh, the founder of Radisson Edwardian Hotels, is locked in legal conflict with his father who accuses him of shaming his family by turning his back on a Hindu property sharing tradition.
Bal Singh claims that his son Jasminder, whose reported £350m fortune makes him a regular on the Sunday Times Rich List, was brought up as part of a "Hindu Joint Family" system of sharing assets.
As a result, he claims that all property owned by himself, Jasminder and his other son, Herinder, is beneficially owned jointly by all three of them - including the £10million family home where Bal and Jasminder both still live.
Details of the case emerged today during a preliminary case management conference at London's High Court. In a witness statement before the court, Bal Singh says he and his wife are deeply ashamed that Jasminder should publicly renounce his cultural heritage and the mutual rights and obligations of the family system in which he was brought up.
The statement continues : "That family system based on custom and religious teaching is widely practised and universally understood by Hindhus and Sikhs in India today, just as it was in British India where I was brought up, and is widely practised and universally understood in the Sikh and Hindu communities overseas.
"For Jasminder to deny that and claim all the credit and ownership for himself will be shocking to wide sections of those communities, particularly our family friends."
In the ongoing proceedings, Bal seeks a declaration that the parties' joint beneficial interests in what is described as the Singh family property should be severed into three equal shares, to be split between himself, Jasminder and Herinder.
Whilst the case does not, at current, involve Jersey-based family trusts that own the Edwardian Group, Bal Singh maintains that, nevertheless, the joint family property includes substantial assets, including the £10million Tetworth Hall, set in an estate bordering Ascot racecourse, which was bought as a family home.
He says that he and his wife still live there, but in a "most unsatisfactory state" due to the "hostility" of Jasminder and his wife. He claims that the property is too big now that Herinder's family has moved out, and that it should be sold to provide more suitable accommodation for all three of them.
Jasminder claims that he did not have a particularly religious upbringing, and that there was never any agreement to the effect that they were living in a joint Hindu family in which all property held by them would be shared. He says that he played the leading role in building the family's business.
The court heard that Jasminder had brought an application for summary judgment in the case, without the need for a full trial, but abandoned it earlier this month.
Jasminder Singh is the founder, chairman and chief executive of the Radisson Edwardian Hotels, one of London's largest privately-owned hotel groups with ten luxury four- and five-star hotels in central London, as well as others in Heathrow and Manchester.
The Edwardian group has a franchise agreement with US-based Radisson Hotels Worldwide to run its properties under the Radisson Edwardian banner.
By our Court Reporter
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