The Punjab Government has craftily roped in Law Commission to invalidate registration of wakf properties and grab them as Government land.
The Government of Punjab has set its eyes on revenue-yielding wakf properties in the State and begun to claim them for itself one after another. The move is backed by some concerted action, political, executive as well as legal. The roots of the scheme go back to the days of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government (1999-2004) when the then Home Minister L. K. Advani set the scheme into operation. Insiders point out that Mr. Advani had a special interest in seeing the 'trifurcation' of the composite Board. The NDA trifurcated the erstwhile Punjab Wakf Board and thereby triggered the disintegration of the Board and its functioning which had some worthwhile achievements to its credit. Once the composite Board was splintered into three (or four) state entities, the usurpation of the properties became easy.
It may be recalled that Muslims from the territories that came to the Punjab on the Indian side had migrated en masse to Pakistan thereby orphaning the mosques, madrassas, dargahs, ashurkhanas and other religious institutions. When the first Central Wakf Act was enacted, it was thought proper to vest all the wakf properties falling in the area vacated by Muslims in a composite Punjab Wakf Board which remained its custodian even when Punjab came to be divided into three states of Punjab, Himachal Pradesh and Haryana in 1966. Later even the city of Chandigarh was declared a union territory following disputed claims over it by both Punjab and Haryana. The composite board had as many as 11,000 wakf properties— several of them generating quite handsome incomes—but very sparsely populated Muslim areas to benefit from the Welfare schemes. The system worked well as it offered fiscal flexibility as incomes from wakf properties in Punjab could be utilized by welfare institutions in Mewat belt of Haryana, home to about one million Meo Muslims. So also with Himachal Pradesh where Muslim villages were few and far between. Moreover, the three boards now have to spend a lot of revenue on the enhanced administrative infrastructure, with each of them having 11 to 13 members, chairmen, their offices and maintenance. The NDA Government had initiated the process of trifurcation through a cabinet decision while it required a bill in the Parliament.
The process to dispossess the Wakf Board of its valuable properties began thereafter with the Punjab Government ordering the State Law Commission to conduct a fresh survey of the Wakf properties. It may be borne in mind that the previous survey of wakf properties had been carried out between 1970 and 1972 and the properties identified as belonging to the wakf were deemed to have been registered as such. The move was, as is realised now, was intended to find alibis and excuses and declare these properties belonging to farmers or the Government. It may also be borne in mind that due to the migration of Muslims from Indian Punjab to Pakistan, most wakf properties were without original wakf title deeds. It was the first wakf survey that conferred the legitimacy on them as bona fide wakf properties. In essence, the Law Commission's main focus was to detect the properties without wakf deeds and to facilitate their 'usurpation' by the Government, says Rehmat Ali, General Secretary of the Mustjab Muslim Welfare Committee based at Ropar in a petition to Mr. Salman Khurshid, Union Minister of State for Minority Affairs and Company Affairs.
Consequently, six highly valuable properties including Bus Stand at Nakodar, Sport College, Patwar School, Gandhi Vanita Ashram have so far been claimed as Government properties following Law Commission's declaration. Interestingly, Nakodar Bus Stand is still paying rent for the land to the Punjab Wakf Board. The current market value of the six properties is estimated to be around Rs. 10,000 crore. The Board has however challenged the Government claims over the land and declaration by the Law Commission.
Rehmat Ali says, under the section 43 of the Central Wakf Act as legislated in 1995, all the properties registered before this date will be deemed to be wakf properties. He therefore challenges the mutation of the nature of the properties by the Punjab Government under the direction from the Law Commission on the basis of fresh survey and interprets the intention of the Government mala fide. As a further proof, the petition cites that the Law Commission headed by Mr. Justice Arambir Singh Gill sought the inputs regarding properties from one Mr. H. C. Arora, advocate instead of the officials of the Punjab Wakf Board.
Even otherwise, things in the reconstituted Punjab Wakf Board are not hunky dory. Said to be the richest Wakf Board in the past, it is now losing revenue and not able to enhance allocation for the welfare schemes. The Government has nominated more members to the Board than the elected members which is violative of the section 14 of the Wakf Act. The Board's functioning was almost moribund without a head for almost two years and it is only now that the Government has appointed former Director General of Police Mr. Izhar Alam as the chairman. Similar situation prevails in Himachal Pradesh and Haryana where members are being nominated heedless of the provisions of the law.
Interestingly, the Punjab Government, a coalition of Akali Dal and Bhartiya Janata Party, is opposing the formation of Haryana State Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee (by splitting of the SGPC) , a body to take care of Sikh religious properties and interests in Harayana, it was the main mover behind the disintegration of the Punjab Wakf Board. The anomaly in treatment of Sikh and Muslim religious bodies has not gone unnoticed.
Representations made over to important functionaries at the Central level has urged the undoing of the trifurcation of the erstwhile Punjab Wakf Board and reverting to the status quo ante i.e., reinstatement of the composite Board. Even the Rajinder Sachar Committee advised the reversion to the erstwhile position.
