The Joint Committee of Parliament scrutinising the Waqf (Amendment) Bill on Wednesday adopted its report and the amended version of the proposed law with a majority vote, the panel’s chairperson Jagdambika Pal said. Opposition members voiced their strong criticism of the adopted Bill, which was approved with 15-11 votes, alleging that it was “unconstitutional” and will destroy the Waqf board by allowing for the government’s interference in the religious matters of Muslims. Pal, however, claimed that many of the amendments approved by the committee have addressed several concerns of opposition members as well, adding the Bill once enacted will help Waqf board in discharging its duties transparently and more effectively. For the first time, “pasmanda” (backward) Muslims, the poor, women and orphans have been included among beneficiaries of the Waqf, endowment made by Muslims for charitable religious purposes, he added. The seasoned BJP member said the report will be submitted to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on Thursday. It is now for him and Parliament to decide the next course of action, he told reporters when asked if the Bill will be passed in the Budget Session starting from January 31 The committee held 38 meetings in the national capital since its constitution on August 8 last year and toured across the committee as it consulted stakeholders to arrive at its conclusions Opposition MPs, including from the Congress, DMK, TMC, AAP and the AIMIM, maintained their sharp criticism of the committee’s functioning under Pal and the approved version of the Bill. Some of them submitted their dissent and others will be doing do by the 4 PM deadline on Wednesday. They said the report running into 655 pages was circulated to them on Tuesday night, and they were given little time to study it and prepare their dissent. TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee claimed the observation and recommendations of the committee are “wholly perverse”. Owaisi said the propsoed law will destroy Waqf boards and make way for the government’s interference in its functioning. Congress MP Syed Naseer Hussain slammed the amendments as “unconstitutional”, alleging that the Bill is aimed at targeting minorities. DMK’s A Raja echoed their view and said his party will challenge the proposed law in the Supreme Court once Parliament, where the BJP-led NDA has a comfortable majority in both Houses, passes it. Rejecting the criticism, BJP MP Tejasvi Surya said the proposed law aims to bring transparency and accountability in Waqf boards. This will empower the Muslim community, he claimed. While the adopted Bill accepts the government’s stand of removing the “Waqf by user” clause in the existing law, it has added that no cases will be reopened against such properties on a retrospective basis provided these are not in dispute or belong to the government. In its 655-page draft report, the Joint Committee on Waqf Amendment Bill made it clear that the provisions to omit the ‘Waqf by user’ definition of a Waqf property will be with prospective effect. It has also endorsed the government’s move to include non-Muslims in Waqf boards, saying they can be “beneficiaries, parties to disputes, or otherwise interested in Waqf matters”, sources said on Tuesday. It, however, does away with the enquiry power vested with the district collector concerned in cases of disputes with the government, giving the authority to the state government to designate an officer senior to collect to probe the matter. The Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2024, was referred to the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) on August 8, 2024, following its introduction in the Lok Sabha by Union Minority Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju. The Bill aims to amend the Waqf Act, 1995, to address issues and challenges in regulating and managing Waqf properties.
