Waqf Amendment Bill: Concerns Among Muslim Community

The Joint Parliamentary Committee on Waqf Amendment Bill 2024 has sought the opinion of the public on the proposed Bill. Members of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh-affiliate organisations are requesting their comrades to share their views on the proposed Bill. The Muslim Personal Law Board has also come up with their appeals to the community to write against any proposal to amend the Bill.

People in general have no idea what waqf properties are and how they are governed, even though they think they are experts after reading a few newspaper articles and watching television programmes. The public sphere is full of theoretical knowledge about waqf. People know that the waqf properties are tied in the name of Allah, and cannot be transferred, inherited, or sold. The income from this property goes to some noble cause sanctioned by the sharia.

Such properties are managed by a body known as Waqf Boards of different states, formed according to the Waqf Act 1995. A supervisory body, the Central Waqf Council, is there to supervise/advise all the state Waqf Boards, which are staffed by people from the Muslim community. People also know that under the present waqf laws, a waqf tribunal works, which can declare any property as waqf property.

News portals and traditional mass media are full of stories of land grab by boards belonging to the people of the Hindu community or to those of the government. Taj Mahal was declared by the Waqf Tribunal of Uttar Pradesh, as a waqf property! True, but who are these responsible people who act like this? Members of the Muslim community and the Waqf Boards! But who are the decision-makers in the Waqf Boards? All the members might be from the Muslim community, like any other religious or temple boards, where members can only be from the community of that temple. All the members of the Waqf Boards are nominated by the respective state governments, mostly people from the ruling party in the state. For them, their party comes first, because they are on the board at the pleasure of the party and government. The tribunal is constituted of justices from high courts and government officials. The management of the boards is responsible not to the community, but to the government.

The waqf laws and boards came into existence because of the activism of Muslim leaders who were concerned about the community's well-being. The colonial government had withdrawn itself from managing religious or charitable properties through its Religious and Charitable Endowments Act 1863. The logic behind the Act of 1863 was that the colonial government did not want to interfere in matters of ‘native religion’.

But the Muslim community leader, like Justice Amir Ali, who was a product of Hugli College (originally an Imambara attached school financed by the waqf properties), pressed for the management by the colonial government. Some of them were concerned with the fragmentation of Muslim elites’ property in the new situation of the colonial government. They compelled the government to enact the Mussalman Waqf Act 1923, and through this Act, they compelled the Mutuwallis (custodians) of the auqaf to render the accounts of the waqf properties managed by them for inspection.

The boards were formed under the UP Waqf Act of 1936, which was later converted into a central Waqf Act in 1954. The motive behind the original Waqf Act of 1923 was to utilise the income from the waqf properties spread all over the country for modern education of the Muslim community. It did not help the community. After Independence, the Zamindari Abolition Act was passed, and properties in agricultural land were distributed among landless peasants, diminishing any hope of a flow of revenue for modern education.

Muslim Community’s Concern Today

Unlike Muslim community leaders who were instrumental in bringing the Act of 1923, the community today does not expect that the waqf properties will solve all their problems. Neither do they have utopian- like views like the Sachar Commission, in whose opinion the waqf properties could produce an annual revenue of Rs 12,000 crore.

The community today is more concerned with their basic needs, in fact extremely basic—like existing with their identity intact. They need basic community life, which revolves around mosques, where they can offer prayers, and not attract the wrath of their Hindu brethren for offering namaz on the roads. The mosques also serve as maktabs, where children are instructed in the basics of religion.

The mosque becomes a centre from where one seeks and gets help when someone in the family dies. The dead person, in Islam, is required to be buried in a graveyard. All the mosques and graveyards are waqf properties. Community members, in the past and in contemporary times, crowdfund and acquire a property for these basic requirements. These properties are waqfs.

The major chunk of the waqf properties is required to be maintained by contribution from the community, whether it is a mosque, where at least two people are employed traditionally to lead the prayer and to call for the prayers—imam and muezzin), or a graveyard or a madrasa/maktab. It has been a tradition in a qasba or town to build a few shops and/or houses or a few small rooms, which are called hujras attached with the mosques, to meet their regular expenses. But salaries and building maintenance are required to be met by regular financial contributions by visitors to the mosques.

Properties, such as mosques and graveyards, are centrally located in many places in the cities and, in monetary terms, have high value, like any other real estate in the town. But these properties can neither theoretically nor legally be transferred, inherited, or sold. Which means these properties only have value when they are encroached upon or stolen.

Mosques cannot be developed to make space for a shopping mall, as suggested by some on two grounds—the nature of the waqf properties cannot be changed legally, and we require more space in the mosques to accommodate the extra namazis on Fridays and Eids, so that people do not occupy roads for offering prayers.

At present, urban planners and developers do not keep Muslim citizens in mind while developing an area for housing at least. Those people who buy houses or flats in these areas completely depend on the nearby mohalla qabristan for the disposal of bodies of their dead kin. Which means, in cities like Delhi, the graveyards are overburdened. In crowded cities like Delhi, these graveyards provide open space, greenery, and a good environment and should be promoted as such by planting more trees. That will be of use to all. They cannot be developed into revenue-paying real estate.

Waqfs in Delhi 

Having considered the aforementioned concerns, we should now study the properties under the supervision of the Delhi Waqf Board (as the example of urban waqf properties, which are understood to have more potential to be developed into high value real estate) to understand the realities on the ground.

The Press Information Bureau came up with a notification on February 2, 2023, wherein the data relating to total waqf properties was updated on the WAMSI (Waqf Assets Management System of India) portal. Under the Delhi Waqf Board, the portal shows a total number of waqf properties as follows: 

It is interesting to note that there are only 85 mosques listed on the portal, and only one graveyard. The largest number of the waqfs listed above is of shops, which gives a picture that commercially viable properties are more in numbers, including four plots of land. On the face of it, this data looks laughable. Only 85 mosques for around 14 lakh plus Muslim population in Delhi!

This writer tried to find the detailed list of the properties under the Waqf Board and found a list of 1,012 properties on the website of the Department of Revenue, Government of National Capital Territory. The following table is extracted from the list:

It seems the WAMSI portal reports ‘mosque with shop/s’ as shops only. However, it is difficult to understand why 92 graveyards are missing from the portal? The DWB was more interested in showing commercially viable properties. Whatever their reason might be, one can safely say that the survey of the property is faulty.

The list on the Revenue Department, on the other hand, provides not only the numbers but also details of the property, under whose management currently the property is, reference of records of waqfnama available with the department, purpose of the waqf as decided by the waqif (the one who has dedicated the property), Mpl number/khasra and measurement, and whether the waqf is for family. A few cash waqfs deposited with banks are also mentioned.

A few properties are also listed that are historical in nature, like different tombs located inside Humayun’s Tomb. These few properties listed as waqf have been a bone of contention between the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) and Waqf Boards. The properties historical in nature are unnecessarily listed when thes cannot be maintained by DWB, and tend to divert attention from the real issues of waqf management. These properties should be removed from the list and must be under the care of ASI.

The above table clearly shows that around 78.062 % (serial nos. 1, 2 and 3 added together) are waqf properties, which cannot produce revenue, but require regular maintenance and financial assistance. Only 20.158% properties (serial no.10) can generate revenue, if developed properly. Which means, these properties will have the burden of maintaining those who require regular maintenance.

The DWB needs grant-in-aid from the Delhi government and has received around Rs.100 crore in the past five years mainly for the disbursement of salaries to the employees of the board.

As discussed above, the waqf properties are valuable only to those who are instrumental in managing them. Individually, those who have the power to lease them out or encroach upon them can benefit. State Waqf Boards, with the help of the Central Waqf Council or Waqf Development Corporations, have failed to achieve any success in developing waqf properties all these years despite having resources at their hands. This will continue if the SWB and CWC continue to be the sanctuary for the party loyalists. The waqfs' management should be directly accountable to the Muslim community, since waqf properties (mosques, dargahs, and graveyards) are part of their pragmatic community life.

Parliament should pass an Act like the one for gurudwaras. The Sikh Gurudwaras Act 1925 has provisions for directly elected bodies. The body thus formed should have reservations for women, pasmanda Muslims (Other Backward Classes and Scheduled Tribes) and other communities who believe in Allah and the first prophet and the last prophet of Islam.

The election should be conducted by the Election Commission of India and the expenses should be met by collecting Rs.100 from each voter, which shall be paid at the time of casting their votes. Once the body is formed, the SWB should run a donation drive to finance its expenses by creating a mechanism in every mosque. The rich and the middle class of the Muslim community will have to contribute financially. The community has shown its resolve by financing these many boarding madrasas. The annual zakat revenue can be streamlined to maintain SWBs and can finance the welfare work taken up by these elected bodies.

The writer is Assistant Professor, Department of History, PGDAV College (Eve.), University of Delhi. matiz@outlook.in . The views are personal.