London businessman with OBE branded ‘rogue landlord’ after council finds vulnerable people living in ‘appalling conditions’ at his houses
By Newsdesk
A respected London businessman, who is also a recipient of Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) award, has been declared a “rogue landlord” by a West London council.
According to MyLondon, Nirpaul Riat was taken to court for his poor management of 22 properties where tenants lived in “appalling conditions”. An Emergency Prohibition Order was issued by Hounslow Council, and after finding that the conditions in each of his properties were poor, the judges fined him £300,000 for a number of issues.
Riat had unlawfully converted the houses into flats and rented out the outbuildings to vulnerable individuals, subjecting them to live in deplorable conditions. These conditions comprised of damp, filthy rooms with minimal natural light, a lack of hot water, inconsistent heating, and issues with leaks and mould.
Judges at Isleworth Crown Court imposed a fine on the businessman for his twenty-year-long management of illegally converted houses, which involved converting a property into eight flats and renting an outbuilding in Osterley without proper authorisation. Failure to pay the fine could result in him being sent to prison.
This is not the first time that Riat has been caught taking the cheap and illegal route. MyLondon finds that in 2009 he was fined £20,000 for or illegally converting a property in Hanworth into flats.
He was awarded an OBE in 2011 ‘for services to Charity and to the Punjabi People’ after he raised around £50,000 for air ambulance services, Thames Valley CrimeStoppers and Great Ormond Street Hospital.
But, after it was discovered that he has broken the law several times, the Hounslow Council has been forced to seek Riat to be stripped of his OBE, MyLondon reports.
Councillor Tom Bruce, Cabinet Member for Regeneration and Development at Hounslow Council, said, “This landlord treated his tenants as nothing more than a commodity – exploiting residents in need of housing for his own financial gain.
“While these residents were left to languish in these appalling conditions, Nirpaul grew rich at their expense. I hope today’s verdict sends a message that we do not – under any circumstances – tolerate rogue landlords in Hounslow and will use the full force of the law to prosecute them.”
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