Merely registering land in someone’s name does not make him its owner

Question

Question: (1) My father, Jamshed Khan, passed away in 1965. Several years before that a friend of my father, Hafiz ‘Ali, said to my father: “I need to obtain a gun licence from the government, and the government grants a gun licence only to someone in whose name some land is registered.” My late father put 53 acres of land in the respected Hafiz’s name, and by showing this record in the land-record account he obtained the licence from the government.

Answer

If it was settled beforehand that the name was being entered in the papers only for the purpose of obtaining the licence and that ownership was not being conferred, and then the respected Hafiz did not take possession (qabd) of the land, this gift (hiba) is not valid under the Shari‘a. The respected Hafiz had no right to mortgage this land and take a loan against it.

Source: Fatawa Mahmudiyya

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