Supreme Court to consider urgent listing of pleas challenging validity of Waqf Act

CJI Sanjiv Khanna

Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna on Monday said the petitions challenging the constitutionality of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 will be listed for hearing in due course. The Supreme Court agreed to consider listing for urgent hearing the petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025.

A bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and justices Sanjay Kumar and KV Viswanathan took note of the submissions of senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind, that there were several petitions on the issue and they needed to be listed for urgent hearing.

Besides Sibal, senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi and lawyer Nizam Pasha mentioned other petitions for urgent listing. The CJI, who has done away with the practice of oral mentioning of cases for urgent listing, asked the lawyers to file letters or send mails for getting the matters listed before a bench.

President Droupadi Murmu on Saturday gave her assent to the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2025, which was earlier passed by Parliament after heated debates in both Houses. Several pleas, including those by Congress MP Mohammad Jawed, AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi and AAP MLA Amanatullah Khan, were filed in the top court challenging the validity of the Act.

In its petition, the Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind has said that this law was a "direct attack on the country's Constitution, which not only provides equal rights to its citizens but also grants them complete religious freedom". It claimed the Act was a "dangerous conspiracy" to strip Muslims of their religious freedom.

In its separate plea filed in the top court, Samastha Kerala Jamiathul Ulema, a religious organisation of Sunni Muslim scholars and clerics in Kerala, has claimed the Act was a "blatant intrusion" into the rights of a religious denomination to manage its own affairs in the matter of religion.