India’s new Waqf law, passed as the UMEED Act, introduces state control and non-Muslim representation, sparking fears of dispossession and loss of Muslim autonomy over religious endowments.
Quratulain Rehbar
NEW DELHI — For India’s nearly 200 million Muslims, a controversial piece of legislation has triggered protests, legal challenges, and a renewed sense of vulnerability.
The Waqf (Amendment) Bill 2025 has passed India’s lower house of Parliament with the support of 288 MPs, despite fierce opposition from 232 members. It has been since renamed as the Unified Waqf Management, Empowerment, Efficiency, and Development Act, or UMEED (“hope”).
India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi called it a “watershed moment,” framing it as part of his government’s broader agenda to bring efficiency, and transparency to religious and charitable institutions.
Many Muslims, however, view it as a controversial law aiming to change board structures, increase state oversight, and allow non-Muslims to be appointed to Waqf bodies for the first time. For them, it is about disenfranchising Muslims in India, and a troubling shift in how the Indian state engages with its Muslim population.
All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief, Asaduddin Owaisi, known for his vocal advocacy of minority rights, condemned the legislation as “unconstitutional” and has filed a petition in the Supreme Court.
In Muzaffarnagar, Uttar Pradesh, over 300 people have received notices for protesting the bill, while 24 individuals were asked to furnish bonds of ₹2 lakh apiece for the symbolic act of wearing black badges.
This move comes at a time when mosques and Islamic structures across India are increasingly being drawn into legal and political disputes, with right-wing groups challenging the historical legitimacy of Muslim religious sites, from Gyanvapi in India’s Varanasi to Shahi Idgah in northern India’s Mathura and in Uttar Pradesh’s Sambhal .
Waqf: what remains, what changes?
The Islamic institution of Waqf—an endowment typically used to fund mosques, schools, orphanages, and hospitals—has a long history in South Asia. Modern Indian law recognised it formally through successive acts in 1954, 1995, and 2013.
According to WAMSI (Waqf Management System of India), there are 356,352 registered Waqf properties, concentrated in states like Uttar Pradesh (124,866), Karnataka (33,147), and West Bengal (7,060).
The Ministry of Minority Affairs estimates the total value of immovable Waqf assets at $14.22 billion, spread out across 30 states and Union Territories. More than 73,000 Waqf assets are under dispute and could be impacted by new provisions under the Bill.
The Waqf system has roots going under British colonial rule. Post-independence, India passed its first Waqf Act in 1954, followed by revisions in 1995 and 2013.
“Since 2014, the BJP government has incrementally chipped away at the protections granted under the 1995 and 2013 Acts,” Dr Qasim Ilyas, spokesperson for the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) tells TRT World. “The latest proposed amendments, passed quietly, with no engagement with Muslim civil society, mark a dramatic shift.”
One of the arguments by the Modi government is to provide “transparency” diversity and fight mismanagement with the new law but community leaders argue the Waqf Boards were already subject to multiple layers of oversight — both internally and externally.
But as Dr Ilyas points out, “The Central Waqf Council and State Boards were created precisely to monitor and regulate Waqf properties… They were autonomous but accountable.”
The Ministry of Minority Affairs estimates the total value of immovable waqf assets at $14.22 billion, spread out across 30 states and Union Territories. Photo: AFP
Ghazala Jamil, author of Accumulation by Segregation, a book on Muslim segregation in India, believes that in a climate where public data is commodified and minority citizenship is treated with suspicion, centralising Waqf data under government control poses serious risks.
“Forcing Waqf data into a centralised, government-controlled database effectively hands a weapon to those intent on dispossessing Muslims of their properties, which form their community resources and historical heritage,” she tells TRT World.
She adds, “In the current political climate, where Waqf properties are increasingly framed in right-wing narratives as targets for land grabs and ‘reclamation,’ stripping Waqf Boards of autonomy is not a neutral administrative act — it actively weakens the Muslim community’s ability to defend its lands against disputes, encroachments, and organised political hostility.”
Legal experts echo these concerns, saying the proposed amendments aim to dismantle the foundational legal and constitutional framework that has historically governed Waqf in India.
“By introducing vague, arbitrary, and constitutionally untenable conditions — such as requiring an individual to not only be Muslim but also a demonstrably ‘practicing’ Muslim to create a Waqf — the government is effectively weaponising administrative discretion to deny a fundamental religious right,” M.R. Shamshad, a senior Supreme Court advocate, tells TRT World.
He adds that the constitutional right under Article 26, which allows religious communities to manage their own affairs, remains intact for Hindus, Sikhs, and to a large extent, Christians.
“Yet, through this amendment, the state is systematically stripping Muslims of that very autonomy under the pretext of reform,” he says, adding that the justification of curbing corruption is disingenuous, since Waqf institutions are already subject to stringent regulations under laws like the Prevention of Corruption Act and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
“If corruption alone is a valid reason for state takeover, then logically, every religious institution in India should be treated the same — but we know that’s not the case,” he adds.
Ramifications on Muslim majority Kashmir?
The bill has also created an uproar in India-administered Kashmir and within the Jammu and Kashmir assembly.
Since the abrogation of Article 370 in 2019 that granted the region semi-autonomy, even the religious autonomy has been steadily eroded. The Waqf Board, once governed by state law, is now under central control. In a telling move, the BJP appointed one of its leaders, Dr Darakhshan Andrabi, as the Board’s chairperson.
Kashmiri politicians, too, see the new amendment bill further deepening this control by centralising powers, curbing community management, and giving the government authority to review and even de-notify Waqf properties.
Post the abrogation of Article 370… The new Waqf legislation, following the abrogation of Article 370, allows non-Muslims on Waqf Boards, enabling external control over Muslim religious affairs—an especially concerning move in centrally governed Kashmir, where local religious institutions are increasingly losing community ownership to state control, according to Agha Syed Ruhullah, a Member of Parliament from Kashmir.
Ruhullah points out a jarring contrast: “Jammu and Kashmir had provided complete autonomy to Hindu religious institutions like the Vaishno Devi Shrine Board… Yet now, Waqf Boards… will be subject to oversight by those outside the faith,” Ruhullah tells TRT World.
“It is to violate Muslims’ religious freedom and autonomy in managing their charitable institutions,” says Ruhullah in the context of Kashmir with its heritage deeply rooted in shrines and saints, the bill is even more critical.
The legislation, which allows non-Muslims to be appointed to Waqf boards for the first time, also introduces sweeping state oversight over Islamic charitable properties.
That contrast is not merely institutional but symbolic. “Faith is not a revenue model—it’s identity, memory, and resistance,” tells Waheed Para, another Member of the Legislative Assembly, TRT World.
“Especially in places like Kashmir, there’s growing fear that these spaces could now be easily acquired under the pretext of development. For the state, it’s about infrastructure; for the community, it’s about identity. These shrines have been preserved for over 700 years. Reducing them to mere property is what’s really at stake,” Para adds.
Reform as ideology
For the ruling BJP, which has increasingly faced criticism for its Hindu nationalist agenda and alienation of Muslim citizens, the changes are seen to further marginalize the Muslim population.
“In practice, this opens the door for RSS-affiliated individuals to gain influence over religious and charitable spaces,” said Dr Ilyas.
Critics argue this isn’t simply bureaucratic restructuring — it’s part of a larger performance of power as It allows the Modi government to present itself as modernizing and anti-corruption while simultaneously eroding the last remaining autonomous institutions of a marginalized community.
“Any resistance or protest from Muslims, in turn, is weaponised to reinforce narratives of Muslims being anti-development or defiant of democratic processes,” says Asim Ali, a political analyst. “The law serves not just administrative ends but also ideological ones, reinforcing Hindutva’s dominance while pushing Muslims further into the margins.”
C. TRT Global
