Supreme Court’s refusal to stay certain parts of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025, deeply disappointing, says Jawahirullah

Manithaneya Makkal Katchi president M.H. Jawahirullah said on Tuesday that the Supreme Court’s refusal to stay certain aspects of the Waqf  (Amendment) Act, 2025, was “deeply disappointing” as it had “unfortunately endorsed several harmful amendments”. He said the ruling “falls short of providing complete constitutional protection”.

In a statement, he said the court had selectively addressed the 44 amendments introduced by the BJP government in Parliament and left most of the “regressive provisions untouched”. “While the court has stayed certain provisions, it has failed to impose an interim stay on many others that violate the fundamentals of the Constitution. This is deeply disappointing. The court has also ruled that up to 4 non-Muslims may sit on the 22-member Central Waqf Council, and up to 3 non-Muslims on the State Waqf Boards… This ruling is discriminatory. If outsiders cannot serve on the boards of the Hindu or Sikh faiths, it is discriminatory to allow non-Muslims to sit on the Waqf Boards,” he said.

Professor Jawahirullah welcomed the court’s decision to stay the amendment requiring a person to prove that he has followed Islam for at least 5 years before creating a Waqf. “However, by leaving it to the State governments to define who qualifies as a Muslim, the verdict empowers governments inimical to Muslims to restrict who may create Waqf, setting a dangerous precedent,” he said.

He said the court’s interim order on ‘Waqf by User’ was alarming and said the centuries-old mosques and graveyards, established through continued usage, faced an existential threat. “Particularly, paragraphs 143-152 of the judgment have further complicated the issue. Additionally, the following three deleted provisions of the original Act have not been addressed: Section 104: allowing non-Muslims to create Waqf; Section 107: exempting recovery of encroached Waqf  properties from the Limitation Act, 1963; and Section 108: special provisions concerning evacuee Waqf properties.”

Professor Jawahirullah called the Waqf (Amendment) Act a conspiracy to weaken and usurp Waqf properties and demanded its repeal in its entirety.