The eight-hour debate on the Waqf Amendment Bill, proposing changes to laws that decide how muslim charitable properties are administered started on Wednesday with union minister Kiren Rijiju tabling the Waqf (Amendment) Bill 2025 in the Lok Sabha for consideration and passage.
The bill seeks to improve the administration of Waqf properties, introduce technology-driven management and ensure transparency.
Addressing the House, the minister said that over 97.27 lakh petitions, memorandums were received by the Joint Parliament Committee through physical and online formants and the JPC had gone through each of them before finalizing its report.
The minister said as many as 284 delegations submitted their views on the bill besides the Waqf boards of 25 states and Union Territories.
Legal luminaries, charitable organisations, academicians and religious leaders, among others, have also submitted their opinions, he said.
He bagan with launching jabs at Congress and said that the party would have given the Parliament to the Waqf if not stopped as it had made significant changes when it was in power in the centre.
“A case going on since 1970 in Delhi involved several properties, including the Parliament building,” he added.
He said if we would not introduce this bill today, the building we are sitting in could have been claimed as Waqf property. “If Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not come to power, several other properties would also have been denotified,” the minister said.
The Waqf Amendment Bill was first tabled in the Lok Sabha in August last year amid furious protests from the opposition which slammed the proposed law as ‘draconian’.
Later it was sent to the Committee which filed its report in February after Opposition MPs said their views had been ignored.
