After row, Maha govt withdraws order to allocate Rs 10cr to Waqf board

A day after issuing a government resolution (GR) for the release of Rs 10 crore funds to strengthen the state Waqf Board, the Maharashtra government on Friday withdrew the order amid opposition by the Bharatiya Janata Party.

IMAGE: Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde with deputy CMs Ajit Pawar and Devendra Fadnavis at Varsha Bungalow in Mumbai on November 23, 2024. Photograph: Sahil Salvi for Rediff.com

State Chief Secretary Sujata Saunik confirmed that the order has been withdrawn.

The BJP, which won the recent state assembly elections as part of the Mahayuti alliance, opposed the GR saying the decision was taken at the administrative level, and added that Waqf Board has no place in the Constitution.

Top state BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis, who served as deputy chief minister in the outgoing dispensation and is seen as front runner to head the new government, said the caretaker government has withdrawn its decision as it was not appropriate.

The new government will probe the timing and validity of the GR, he added.

Samajwadi Party MLA Rais Shaikh said the government's decision to withdraw the order shows the new dispensation is "anti-minority".

He demanded Rs 100 crore for strengthening the state Waqf board.

Eknath Shinde is currently the caretaker chief minister of Maharashtra after the term of the 288-member legislative assembly ended on November 26.

The ruling Mahayuti retained power in the state, pocketing a whopping 230 of the 288 assembly seats. The BJP won 132 seats, the Shiv Sena 57 and the NCP got 41 seats.

On Thursday, the government issued the GR, stating that the finance and planning department has approved a Rs 10 crore grant for strengthening the Maharashtra State Board of Waqfs (MSBW) headquartered in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar.

When asked whether the GR was withdrawn, Saunik confirmed the development.

According to the GR issued on Thursday, Rs 20 crore were earmarked for 2024-25 for strengthening of the state Waqf Board. Of that, Rs 2 crore were already disbursed to the board.

The chief executive officer of the Waqf Board has been asked to take precautions to keep the expenditure under the prescribed norms, it said.

In a post on X, the Maharashtra BJP said "fake news" was being spread that the BJP-Mahayuti government gave a grant of Rs 10 crore for the Waqf Board.

"The decision was taken by officers at the administrative level. The GR has been scrapped after stiff opposition by the BJP. The BJP is firm on its stand that the waqf board has no place in the Constitution," the Maharashtra unit of the BJP said in the post.

Samajwadi Party MLA Rais Shaikh said the Muslim community constitutes 12 percent of the state's population, and due to the Waqf board's lack of resources, 60 percent of its properties have been encroached upon.

The board lacks the funds to pursue property-related legal battles and requires this financial support to manage its daily operations, he claimed.

The state has 23,566 Waqf properties covering an area of 37,330 hectares, with the highest number of properties in the Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar division, he said.

These developments come amid a row over the Centre's Waqf (Amendment) Bill.

The Union government had listed the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2024 in its legislative agenda for the winter session of Parliament pending a report from the parliamentary panel.

The bill seeks to amend the Waqf Act, 1995 to ensure more accountability and transparency in the functioning of Waqf Boards and also has provisions for mandatory inclusion of women in these bodies.

The bill was introduced in the Lok Sabha on August 8 and referred for examination to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) constituted under the Chairmanship of Lok Sabha MP Jagdambika Pal.

Earlier this week, opposition members in the JCP met Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla seeking an extension of the tenure of the panel by a "reasonable time" to allow substantive deliberations on the expansive legislation.