NEW DELHI: Prominent Muslim organisations across India have announced a boycott of all political iftar parties in protest against a proposed amendment bill that grants the government unprecedented control over the moveable or immovable properties donated by Muslims for religious and charitable purposes.
The bill proposed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu majoritarian Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in August last year is set to be presented again in Parliament during the second phase of the Budget Session.
Having passed through the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) without accepting any changes or suggestions from Opposition MPs, the bill is expected to trigger protests both inside and outside Parliament.
Muslim organisations and legal experts believe that a closer examination of the new amendments suggests a subtle encroachment on the religious freedom of Muslims, thereby undermining the core principles of secularism.
In January this year, in Ujjain, a city located in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, authorities demolished nearly 250 properties, including homes, shops, and a century-old mosque, in order to clear a 2.1-hectare (5.27-acre) plot of land.
India, home to more than 200 million Muslims, has the largest number of waqf assets in the world – more than 872,000 properties, spanning nearly 405,000 hectares (1 million acres), with an estimated value of about $14.22bn. They are managed by waqf boards in every state and federally-run territory.
Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind president Maulana Arshad Madani has announced that the organisation will boycott events such as ‘Iftaar,’ ‘Eid Milan,’ and similar gatherings hosted by Nitish Kumar, the head of JD(U), his Andhra Pradesh counterpart and TDP leader Chandrababu Naidu, and Chirag Paswan, the founding president of the Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas).
Madani stated that this move is a “symbolic protest” against the NDA leaders’ “silence” regarding the Waqf Bill introduced by the Narendra Modi government at the Centre.
Meanwhile, another Muslim organisation, Imarat Shariah, headquartered in Patna, has also announced that it was turning down the invitation for the government hosted ‘Iftaar’ of Nitish Kumar, whom it accused of “supporting” the Bill that could “make worse the economic and educational backwardness” of the community.
Last week authorities in Nagpur city of India’s Maharashtra state imposed an indefinite curfew after violent clashes between Hindu and Muslim groups triggered by demands from Hindu nationalist organisations for the demolition of the tomb of 17th-century Mughal ruler Aurangzeb.
India has witnessed a series of disputes over historic mosques, with Hindu extremists arguing that many were built on the ruins of temples. Several cases concerning such claims remain pending in court.
In 2023, Modi inaugurated a controversial temple in Ayodhya at the site of the Babri Masjid, a 16th-century mosque demolished by Hindu mobs in 1992.
