PUSHED TO THE MARGIN
- 19 Muslims among 474 members at the IT Appellate Tribunal
- The Armed Forces Tribunal had two Muslims among its 18 members
- The Central Administrative Tribunal had a Muslim among 14 chiefs
- The Railway Claims Tribunal had three Muslim members
TRIBUNALS, the quasi-judicial bodies for settling various administrative and tax-related disputes in India, have seen fewer Muslims holding the posts as their chiefs, members and senior officials. That includes the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT), the oldest of all tribunals, dating January 1941, according to Mohammed Abdul Mannan’s new book, At the Bottom of the Ladder: State of the Indian Muslims –https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0GF1Q9R25 – which quantifies Muslim presence in 150 key organisations, including Union ministries, departments, and other organisations.
Since its establishment, ITAT has been functioning more or less on similar lines except for necessary consequential changes introduced due to its expansion and jurisdiction extension. The ITAT has seen 10 chiefs with no Muslims. Its 10 Vice Presidents have no Muslim as well, as has been the case with 62 VPs since 1972. However, its 94 members include three Muslims – Wasim Ahmed, S Rifa Ur Rahman, and Shamim Yahya, all accountant members. No Muslim is among the 12 present-day deputy and assistant registrars.
The former 380 members include 16 Muslims – Mohammed Munir (1941-42); Yahya Ali (1942-45); Syed Ali Khan (1942-47); MA Rauf (1945-46); Syed Uz Zaman (1946-47); KB Kalbe Abbas (1946-50); MR A Ansari (1964-69); Nazir Ahmed (1972-81); M Fatima Beevi (1980-83); MA Khan (1986-95); Abdul Razack (1991-2003); Sikander Khan (1996-2003); Ahmed Fareed (2003-2009); Riyaz Abdul Sattar Padvekar (2005-2015), and Akber Basha A (2007-11). No Muslim became its registrar or deputy from 23 officials holding that post. However, one of the 44 assistant registrars had been a Muslim, Mohamad Irfan, who held that post from May 1996 to July 1998.
The Appellate Tribunal for Electricity (ATE), formed in 2005 to hear complaints or appeals relating to orders issued by the adjudicating officer or the Central Regulatory Commission and State Electricity Regulatory Commissions, has seen nine chairpersons, with none being a Muslim. There is not a single Muslim among its present three members, or the largest minority community has a representation among its registrar and deputy registrars. Its 23 members till now included only a single Muslim, Anwar Ahmed Khan, a technical specialist from 2005 to 2009. None of its 23 officials is a Muslim.
The Appellate Tribunal, the conglomeration of the tribunals set up to hear appeals under SAFEMA (1976), NDPS (1985), PMLA (2002), Prohibition Benami Property Transactions Act (PBPTA) (1988) and FEMA (1999), on orders passed by the Financial Intelligence Unit, India (FIU-India), has five members, including its chairman. None of them belongs to the Muslim community. Its 14 former chairpersons were all non-Muslims. One of its 31 former members was Muslim – MWA Khan, from October 1981 to September 1984.
The Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT), in operation since August 2009 for adjudication or trial in disputes and complaints about commissioning, appointments, enrolments and conditions of service in Army, Navy and the Air Force, has its principal bench in New Delhi with regional benches at Chandigarh, Lucknow, Kolkata, Guwahati, Chennai, Kochi, Mumbai, Jabalpur, Srinagar and Jaipur. Chandigarh and Lucknow regional benches have three sub-benches each. All the other locations have a single bench.
Each bench comprises a judicial member and an administrative member. Its present chairperson and members number six, with no Muslims. It had seen four chairpersons since September 2008. None of them was a Muslim. Its 18 members included two Muslims – Lt Gen Zameeruddin Shah, from June 2009 to May 2012, and Lt Gen PM Hariz, from September 2020 to September 2024.
The Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), set up in 1985 to resolve grievances of employees of the Union and state governments in their service matters, currently has 19 benches across the country. After the establishment, it received 13,350 pending cases on transfer from the high courts and subordinate courts under the Administrative Tribunal Act. The CAT has a bench of 64 members with 32 members each from judicial and administrative backgrounds.
One of its 14 chairpersons had been a Muslim – Justice Syed Rafat Alam, a former Chief Justice of Madhya Pradesh High Court who served from August 2012 for three years and 240 days. Its past 98 Vice-Chairpersons at the Principal Bench included five Muslims – Justice S Zaheer Hasan (1985-88), Justice Nazir (1986-89), Justice S Haque (1991-94), Justice DH Nasir (1998-2001), and Justice MA Khan (2004-2006). The 217 administrative members included five Muslims – P S Habeeb Mohammed (1989-92), SAT Razvi (2000-2002), K Noord Jehan (2008-2013), Anwar Ahsan (2013-2017), and Mohammed Haleem Khan (2013-2017).
The 147 judicial members have 10 Muslims – SF Rizvi (1991-1993), SKI Naqvi (1999-2001), Rafiq Uddin (1999-2003), A Sadat Khan (2001-2003), Muzaffar Hussain (2003-2007), Justice Wajahat Al Shah (2009-2011), Justice Syed Mohammed Mahfooz Alam (2009-2012), Justice Anwar Ahmed (2009-2011), Justice AK Basheer (2012-2014) and Dr Murtaza Ali (2013-2017). The present CAT chairperson and members are numbered 12 without a single Muslim on board. Its 53 bench members included a Muslim – Mir Syed Latif, who took over in September 2023.
Two Muslims who retired as its members are Mohammed Jamshed at the principal bench and Jasmine Ahmed at the Jodhpur bench. The Central Government Industrial Tribunal-cum-Labour Courts (CGIT-cum-LCs), adjudicating industrial disputes relating to workers at 22 places in various states, presently has 12 presiding officers, including one Muslim, Irfan Qamar posted at Hyderabad. No other data has been shared by the government.
The Customs, Excise and Service Tax Appellate Tribunal (CESTAT), set up to hear appeals against orders and decisions passed under the Customs Act of 1962, Central Excise Act of 1944, and the Service Tax under the Finance Act of 1994, has seen 14 presidents, with none of them a Muslim. Its 109 former members, both judicial and technical, included only a single Muslim – M Moheb Ali, from 2003 to 2005. None of its seven registrars was a Muslim. The count of its present-day president, members and registrar stands at 34 without a single Muslim representation.
The Debts Recovery Tribunals (DRTs) and Debts Recovery Appellate Tribunals (DRATs), formed to facilitate debt recoveries by banks and financial institutions and to design an effective mechanism to recover their dues speedily without a lengthy process involving civil courts, numbered 39 and five respectively. These are single-member tribunals. The 87 registrars, deputy registrars and assistant registrars included three Muslims.
The National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT), a body with an appellate jurisdiction, has seen five chairpersons without a Muslim on board. Its present members are 11, including a Muslim – Justice Mohammad Faiz Alam Khan (Member – Judicial). Its 11 former members have had no Muslim. Currently, its 17 officials include two Muslims.
The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT). a quasi-judicial body that adjudicates issues relating to Indian companies since June 2016, has one principal bench at New Delhi and regional benches each at New Delhi, Ahmedabad, Allahabad, Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Chennai, Guwahati, Jaipur, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai, Cuttack, Jaipur, Kochi, Amravati and Indore. Its 57 sitting members including the president have a Muslim – Shamim Khan at Ahmedabad. Its 77 former president and members included two Muslims – C Mohammed Sharief Tariq and Mohammed Ajmal. Its 42 registrars and other officials include a single Muslim – SK Jafar Ali, Deputy Registrar at Kolkata.
The National Green Tribunal (NGT), a statutory body dealing with the expeditious disposal of cases relating to environmental protection and other natural resources, since 2010, is headquartered in New Delhi and has regional headquarters in Bhopal, Pune, Kolkata and Chennai. None of its four chairpersons had been a Muslim. Its present six judicial members have no Muslim representation. One of its 11 former members has been a Muslim – Justice SN Hussain. One of its five expert members at present is a Muslim – Dr Afroz Ahmed. One of its 15 former expert members was a Muslim – Prof AR Yousuf. None of its 11 registrars-general was Muslim.
The Railway Claims Tribunal, formed to provide speedy disposal of claims against the Railways and fix compensation for loss of lives and refund of fares and freights, had seen 73 chairpersons and members of whom three had been Muslims – Mahtab Ahmed, Member (Judicial) at Guwahati Bench, Tanveer Ahmed, Member (Technical) at Lucknow Bench, and Syed Nishat Ali, Member (Technical) at Nagpur Bench.
The Securities Appellate Tribunal, which hears appeals against the orders of India’s financial regulators, with jurisdiction over companies operating across the country, has only one bench, in Mumbai. No Muslim had been among its six former and present presiding officers. Similar has been the case with its 15 past and present members. The Telecommunications Dispute Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT), adjudicating disputes and appeals to protect the interests of service providers and consumers of the telecommunications sector, had eight chairpersons which had a Muslim – Justice Aftab Alam, from June 2013 to June 2016. No Muslim is among its 12 members as yet.
To read and obtain more data, please visit:
At the Bottom of the Ladder: State of the Indian Muslims – https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0GF1Q9R25
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