MUSLIM ORGANISATIONS of West Bengal, under the aegis of All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), will on Monday organise a protest against the Waqf Amendment Bill, at Kolkata’s Metro Channel.
In a press conference on Saturday, representatives of several organisations said that they were “completely against” the Bill. “On Monday, we are protesting in Kolkata and then on March 13, there will be a protest at Jantar Mantar in Delhi. After that the next course of action will be informed to us by our leaders. This is the month of Ramzan for us, but we will keep our fight on,” said Maulana Qamaruzaman Sb, member, AIMPLB, while speaking with The Indian Express.
According to the leaders and members present at the conference, the Waqf Board is not the only endowment Board with a Special Act status, and instead all religious endowment boards in India have similar provisions.
If other religious endowment boards continue with its autonomous status, while the Waqf Board’s powers are scrapped, it would be a clear violation of Article 14 of the Constitution, they said. They also claimed that the “Amendment of the Waqf Act would threaten several other fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution.”
According to the representatives, despite sending several emails to the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC), presenting valid arguments from AIMPLB and other major central and state-level Muslim organisations, and submitting detailed written documents on each clause of the Amendment Bill, the government has not softened its stance.
The representatives said the West Bengal government has passed a resolution against the Bill in the State Assembly. In response to it, all Muslim leaders have put forward their demand to the state government that when the Bill is presented in Parliament, all Trinamool Congress (TMC) MPs should protest against it and actively participate in the voting process. The TMC should issue a Three-Line Whip to ensure that all its MPs remain present in Parliament during the vote and cast their votes against the bill.
According to leaders and members, in democratic nations, any Law or Bill is firstly discussed with its primary stakeholders before presenting it in the Legislature. Previously, whenever Amendments were made to Waqf laws, Muslim scholars and community leaders were duly consulted, and their well-reasoned opinions and suggestions were considered. However, they alleged that this time, before presenting the Bill in the Parliament, there were neither any consultations nor any discussions with the Muslim leaders or organisations.