Unmasking the exploitation behind religious endowments

The Waqf Amendment Bill was discussed in detail in the Parliament as expected. Although the purpose of this bill was clarified by Union Home Minister Amit Shah while introducing this bill in Parliament, some groups have deliberately tried to paint this bill in a Hindu-Muslim light. There are also attempts to create misunderstandings about the Modi government and the BJP in the minds of the Muslim community.

The BJP opponents have continued their business of trying to serve their political interests by instilling fear in the minds of Muslims about the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Modi government even by means of this bill. In the last 10 years, there have been many attempts to organize the Muslim community against the Bharatiya Janata Party on various issues like the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the Act rendering Triple Talaq illegal, and the construction of the Ram Temple. There was also false propaganda that Muslims will be thrown out of the country due to the CAA Act.

The Shaheen Bagh-like protests in Delhi against this law and the subsequent riots exposed the intentions of those who try to create religious hatred. During the Lok Sabha elections held last year, fatwas were issued to vote against the Bharatiya Janata Party, many Muslim clerics held meetings in mosques and outside and appealed to the people to vote against the BJP. The BJP and the Modi government are being targeted again under the guise of the Waqf Amendment Bill. The congregations protesting against this bill without reading it should come forward to publicly answer how many poor people of the Muslim faith have been benefited by the Waqf Board so far.

The provisions of the previous Waqf Act and the unlimited powers given to the Waqf Boards by the Act were a form of making the Constitution secondary. Those who spread rumors that the Modi government would change the Constitution had never uttered a single word about the Waqf Act being superior to the Constitution. The Waqf Board, which claims rights to the Taj Mahal and Dwarka Island, has snatched the lands of many poor Indians, a fact that Congress, Akhilesh Yadav, Owaisi brothers, and Uddhav Thackeray have not even spoken a word about. 123 properties worth thousands of crores of rupees in areas like Lutyens’ in Delhi were given to the Waqf Board when Dr. Manmohan Singh was the Prime Minister. The land of the Northern Railway in Delhi was also transferred to the Waqf Board. The control of the Waqf Board had gone to the hands of wealthy Muslim groups.

The Muslim community had also complained about this. The Joint Parliamentary Committee appointed on the Waqf Amendment Bill had further exposed the arbitrary management of the Waqf Board. Despite this, the Congress and other opposition parties in the BJP were trying to save the administrators of the Waqf Board. Waqf is a religious matter, but the Waqf Board or the premises of Waqf are not religious. According to the law, a person of any religion can become a Charity Commissioner, because this person does not have to run a charitable institution, but to monitor that it is run properly, therefore the work of the Waqf Board is not a religious work but an administrative work. It is necessary to monitor whether the property donated by any person for the benefit of the society is properly utilized or not.

In Himachal Pradesh, a mosque was built illegally on the pretext of being a Waqf Board land. 400 acres of land belonging to the 1,500-year-old Tiruchendur temple in Tamil Nadu were declared as Waqf property. According to a report by a committee in Karnataka, 29,000 acres of Waqf land was leased out for commercial use. Between 2001 and 2012, Waqf property worth Rs 2 lakh crore was given to private institutions on 100-year leases. In Bengaluru, the transfer of 602 acres of land was blocked due to court intervention, while 1,500 acres of land worth Rs 500 crore in Honwad village of Vijaypur in Karnataka was declared disputed and given to a five-star hotel at a monthly rent of just Rs 12,000. Is it right to lease out property donated by a Muslim ruler hundreds of years ago to a five-star hotel at a monthly rent of just Rs 12,000?

All this money is for the welfare schemes of the Muslim community and not for filling the coffers of the rich. The assets of the Waqf Board should be utilized for the welfare of poor Muslims, divorced women, orphans, unemployed youth and the needy and for implementing activities that train them. Under Section 40 of the Waqf Board Act, the Waqf Board gets the right to ‘reason to believe’.

If this Board believes that a property is a Waqf property, it can itself declare it to be a Waqf property. The process of filing an objection with the Waqf Tribunal and then challenging it in the High Court is very complicated. At present, the Waqf Boards in the country get an annual revenue of Rs 200 crore from these properties. In the last 75 years, the number of lands held by these boards has increased from 35,000 to about 10 lakh plots. When the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) was in power, the Sachar Committee and the Joint Parliamentary Committee were appointed to review the development of Muslims.

Both these committees had pointed out many shortcomings in the functioning of the Waqf Board. The current amendment bill has been prepared on the basis of the recommendations made by these very committees. It is natural for the self-proclaimed contractors of the Muslim religion to be angry with this bill. These groups are opposing this bill fearing that their greedy business will end. The well-established Muslims do not want to allow the development of the deprived sections of their religion.

 

(Article Pre-Published in Times of India Online – 07 April, 2025) 

Keshav Upadhye, Chief Spokesperson