Rijiju to Present Waqf Amendment Bill in Parliament

New Delhi [India], April 2  : 

The Parliament is convening today again, and it appears Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju will table the Waqf Amendment Bill of 2025, which aims to amend the Waqf Act of 1995, for passage.

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will also suggest that the amendments brought by the Rajya Sabha to the Banking Laws (Amendment) Bill of 2024, further amending the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934, the Banking Regulation Act, 1949, the State Bank of India Act, 1955, and the Banking Companies (Acquisition and Transfer of Undertakings) Acts of 1970 and 1980, be looked into.

Besides that, Union Ministers Jitendra Singh, L Murugan, and Ravneet Singh will also lay documents related to their ministries. 

The Waqf (Amendment) Bill will be tabled in Parliament on Wednesday. Both the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Congress are urging their MPs to report to the House.

With the ruling BJP-led National Democratic Alliance and the Opposition INDIA bloc having little inclination to cooperate, the outcome could be based on whichever side has a greater number of members present.

The bill will be brought for discussion and passage after today's Question Hour. Thereafter, there will be an 8-hour debate, which may be extended.

Apart from the BJP and Congress, their allies have also requested all their MPs to report to Parliament on April 2 and 3.

The opposition has been critical of the Waqf Bill, with Samajwadi Party (SP) chief whip Dharmendra Yadav issuing a directive for all its MPs in the Lok Sabha to report on April 2 and participate in discussions regarding the Waqf Amendment Bill.

On Tuesday, members of the INDIA bloc's leaders also met in Parliament to strategize about the Waqf (Amendment) Bill.

The bill had originally been presented to the Lok Sabha last year in August, which resulted in the establishment of a Joint Parliamentary Committee headed by Jagdambika Pal to investigate it further.

This bill seeks to amend the Waqf Act of 1995 to resolve the issues and challenges in managing and supervising Waqf properties.

The Amendment Bill aims at improving how Waqf properties are managed in India. It aims at addressing the loopholes of the previous Act and strengthening the Waqf boards by proposing innovations such as renaming the Act, modernizing what waqf is, enhancing how properties are registered, and employing more technology to maintain waqf records.

The Waqf Act of 1995 was established to govern Waqf properties, yet it has drawn much criticism against it for some of the concerns such as improper management, corruption, and encroachments over land.