A total of 994 waqf properties have been reported as ‘alienated properties’ across the country. Minority affairs minister Kiran Rijiju provided this information in a written reply to a question by Communist Party of India (Marxist) lawmaker John Brittas in the Rajya Sabha on December 9.
Soon after this information was released, nearly all Hindi media channels and websites ran headlines falsely informing the public that “994 properties were illegally occupied by waqf across the country”. Notably, the Waqf Board has also been accused of being involved in “land jihad.”
An “alienated waqf property” refers to waqf land or assets that have been transferred or encroached upon through unlawful means. Yet our so-called informed mainstream media turned the narrative upside down, portraying the rightful owners of the land – whose properties were illegally occupied by others – as the occupiers themselves.
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On November 27, in a written reply to a question by BJP MP Basavaraj Bommai in the Lok Sabha, Rijiju had said that there are 58,929 waqf properties across the country facing encroachment.
Rijiju provided these figures based on data from the Waqf Assets Management System of India (WAMSI) portal, which itself raises serious questions for several reasons.
What is WAMSI?
WAMSI is an online workflow-based Waqf Properties’ Management System developed to manage and maintain up-to-date status of the waqf properties throughout their lifecycles.
Data available on the WAMSI portal reveals that 872,379 immovable and 16,713 movable waqf properties are registered under the Waqf Act, spread across 356,072 waqf estates in the country. However, no information is available on 435,793 out of these 872,379 properties. This suggests that the number of encroachments could be much higher.
Going by the WAMSI data, only 95,277 immovable waqf properties are managed by the waqf board, while the management of 413,766 waqf properties is unknown.
Digitising waqf
On October 23, 2008, a joint parliamentary committee on waqf had submitted its ninth report to the parliament, which, among other recommendations, called for the digitisation of the state waqf board records at an estimated cost of Rs 25 crore. The Union government had approved this recommendation to computerise all waqb board documents.
The pace of this computerisation initiative, which began during Manmohan Singh’s prime ministerial tenure, was initially very slow. However, the process gained momentum after court intervention.
Under Modi government, however, the process is now claimed to be in its final stages. In a written reply in Rajya Sabha last month, it was revealed that out of 3,56,060 documents across 3,30,008 waqf estates, a “significant portion” has been digitised.
Part of the ongoing Qaumi Waqf Board Taraqqiati scheme, the digitisation is expected to continue until 2025-26. The scheme was launched to digitise the records of waqf properties and provide additional funds to both state and centrally administered waqf boards to enhance their effectiveness using geo-tagging, GPS surveying and mapping of waqf lands and assets to collect detailed information, including images, ownership maps, and the condition of the buildings or land surrounding the waqf properties.
However, the government has never been fully transparent about the scheme.
What an RTI revealed about waqf scheme
According to information obtained through an Right to Information (RTI) application by me, the country has two waqf schemes – the Qaumi Waqf Board Taraqqiati Scheme and the Shahri Waqf Sampati Vikas Yojana.
Until 2019-20, the Union government allocated separate budgets for the two schemes. However, in 2020-21, the budgets were merged and as a result, the funding for each scheme was reduced.
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In 2020-21, Rs 21 crore was allocated for the two waqf schemes but only Rs 12 crore was released, and just Rs 3.10 crore was actually spent, according to the response on the RTI filing.
In 2021-22, the budget for these schemes was reduced to Rs 16 crore. Of this, only Rs 12 crore was released, and Rs 7.72 crore was spent.
In 2022-23, just Rs 5.12 crore was spent on these schemes. For the year 2023-24, a budget of Rs 17 crore was allocated, but only Rs 8 crore was released.
What is the reality of waqf digitisation work?
Several waqf activists have complained that the digitisation efforts has been undertaken by the government only to show off, with little genuine intent behind it. Many believe that, in the long run, the benefits from this initiative will be minimal, while the drawbacks could be significant.
In response to a 2021 RTI application with the Central Waqf Council, asking how many complaints had been received regarding the digitisation of waqf properties over past five years, the council said that “no complaints have been received regarding the digitisation of waqf properties in the last five years.”
However, on speaking with former Chief Income Tax Commissioner (IRS) Akramul Jabbar Khan, who resides in Pune, Maharashtra, it became clear that the Central Waqf Council provided false information under RTI.
He shared that he had sent multiple complaints regarding the digitisation of waqf properties to various waqf boards and officials, including to the Central Waqf Council. He had never received a response, and no action was taken on his complaints.
‘Govt focused on making the process appear complete’
Khan explains that under Modi government, officials involved with waqf are doing more harm than good by trying to enhance their own image. He believes the government is more focused on making the process appear complete rather than addressing the underlying issues. Although the work has been carried out efficiently in some aspects, he notes that there are significant flaws.
In most of the digitisation efforts, he says, the information on waqf properties remains incomplete. Many properties are marked “to be deleted”. For instance, the well-known “Bacchon ka Ghar” in Delhi’s Daryaganj is listed as a waqf property but its exact location is missing from the WAMSI portal. In such cases, how if someone were to sell a room from the property, how would they? Who will be accountable for this?
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Khan also points out flaws in the digitised records of Mumbai City and its suburbs, uploaded on the WAMSI portal. He says he repeatedly informed the waqf board about these shortcomings, but the officers have been unwilling to listen or take any action.
He filed an RTI regarding the digitisation of waqf records in Maharashtra. In the response received on September 12, 2023, he found that no funds were allocated for the digitisation work from the financial years 2013-14 to 2018-19.
In 2019-20, the Central Waqf Council provided Rs 13,04,000 to the Centralised Computing Facility (CCF) under the Qaumi Waqf Board Taraqqiati Scheme, but only Rs 6,26,824 was actually spent. Similarly, in 2020-21, CCF had a budget of Rs 23,53,410, but only Rs 5,83,207 was spent. Additionally, a separate fund of Rs 9 lakh was allocated that year but only Rs 1,24,778 was utilised.
Khan also inquired in his RTI about the submission of audit report for the digitisation work. The Central Waqf Council replied, “So far, audit is not being carried out in respect of digitisation work.”
Several properties missing on WAMSI portal
Moid Tungekar, a resident of Uran in Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra, has a more serious problem. He claims that his waqf property spanning 208 acres, is not listed anywhere on the WAMSI website.
He submitted a complaint about this to the Central Waqf Council in March 2019. In response, the Central Waqf Council sent a letter to the Maharashtra State Waqf Board in May that year instructing them to update the information.
However, to date, the details of his waqf property have not been made available on the WAMSI website.
While cross-checking these complaints, I visited the portal (wamsi.nic.in) to review the list of waqf properties in Delhi as well.
According to the website, there are a total of 1,046 waqf properties in Delhi as opposed to the list of 1,964 waqf properties provided to me by the Delhi Waqf Board. Further, when examining the WAMSI data, one could easily conclude that Delhi has just one graveyard, contradicting the Delhi Waqf Board’s data of 562 graveyards, although this number was later revised to 488.
Moreover, a majority of the waqf properties listed on the website lack details about their location. Many properties are valued at zero rupees, and numerous entries are missing images and GPS data. Even more concerning, many waqf properties leave blank crucial fields like administration details, Mutawallis and current status. Large estates covering hundreds of hectares or acres remain unsurveyed. Considering these inconsistencies, how is this information reliable?
On February 12, 2021, the parliamentary standing committee raised concerns about the development and digitisation of waqf properties in its report presented to the Lok Sabha. The committee expressed its dissatisfaction, noting that GIS mapping of 50% of waqf properties across the country was supposed to be completed by March 2020. The Ministry of Minority Affairs failed to meet this target.
The ministry attributed the delay to the Covid-19 lockdown. The committee found this explanation unacceptable, pointing out that the lockdown was imposed only at the end of March by which time the work was supposed to be complete.
Despite all of this, the Modi government continues to manage the waqf system in the country based on an incomplete information, while maintaining an illusion of progress among the public. The lack of transparency, to add to it, poses serious risks to the waqf system and the country at large.
Afroz Alam Sahil is a freelance journalist and author. He can be contacted at @afrozsahil on X.
