Amid the ongoing political row over the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2024, senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and former Union Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said the Bill is the need of the hour. The Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) is set to meet for the first time on Thursday (August 22) to discuss the Waqf (Amendment) Bill introduced by the Modi government during the recently concluded Parliament session.
This bill is important for the BJP and the party strategists want it to be passed in the upcoming winter session of Parliament. However, a lot also depends on the JPC report. The BJP has to bring together not only opposition parties but also allies like Chandrababu Naidu and Chirag Paswan to support the bill. Naqvi said that this entire system (of Waqf Board) will have to come out of the politics of ‘do not touch’. He said that the government has brought this bill to improve the Waqf system.
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Responding to questions raised by opposition parties and some allies, Naqvi said that this is not the first time that the Waqf laws are being amended, amendments were made earlier as well. He said that amendments were made during the Congress tenure and the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government. The bill introduced by the government should be discussed, deliberated and analysed in detail, that is why it has been sent to the JPC. The JPC is a constitutional body and this bill should be discussed with an open mind in its meetings. Whatever arguments any political party has, they will come out in the JPC meetings.
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Opposing the ‘attempts’ to give communal colour to the bill, he said that many questions are being raised about it and efforts are being made to create confusion, so it has been sent to the JPC for in-depth discussion keeping all the parties in mind. He said that this amendment is the need of the hour and it should not be assumed that anyone is being attacked or this bill is against anyone.
