NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court’s prima facie endorsement of non-arbitrariness of provisions of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025, was principally based on a 100-year history of mismanagement and misappropriation of sprawling properties and valuable assets donated for charity by benevolent Muslims and the remedial regulations enacted since 1923.A bench of CJI B R Gavai and Justice A G Masih traced more than 100 years of documented history relating to regulation of waqfs starting from the Waqf Act of 1923, which noticed that the endowments made by pious and public-spirited Muslims were being wasted or systematically misappropriated by those managing them. Writing the 128-page judgment on the interim order, CJI Gavai said the enactment of the 1923 Act was necessitated as people increasingly found waqf endowment being used as a “clever device” to tie up property to defeat creditors and generally to evade the law under the cloak of a plausible dedication to the Almighty. “A system of compulsory registration not merely about the fact of the waqf but also the nature, extent and other incidents of the waqf was found to be necessary even at that point of time,” the CJI said, and drew similarity with similar clauses under the 2025 Act.SC said that the 1923 Act made it an obligation for each waqf to furnish its particulars and allowed verification of credentials, including accounts, by officials. “Not only that, but a penalty was also provided for a person who failed to comply with the statutory requirements of the Act.”After referring to the Bengal Waqf Act of 1934, the bench took note of the provisions of the Waqf Act, 1954, under which a state govt was required to inquire into the existence of waqfs and the properties administered by them through an official. “The provisions with regard to compulsory registration of every waqf also continued under the 1954 Act,” it said.To find out the working of the 1954 Act, Centre had appointed an inquiry committee, which in 1975 recommended “no Mutawalli who has failed to have waqfs registered as required under the 1954 Act should be provided with the facility of enforcing any right in a court of law unless he has duly registered his waqf as required under the Act.”Though the 1954 Act was amended in 1959, 1964 and 1969, the committee’s recommendation was incorporated in the Waqf Amendment Act of 1984, which was opposed by Muslims leading to the law being placed in cold storage.In another parallel with the 2025 Act, SC said the 1995 Waqf Amendment Act provided a detailed procedure for registration of waqfs and bar on enforcement of rights on behalf of unregistered ones, which was in existence till 2013 and was removed hurriedly before the 2014 LS polls.
