Defending the Waqf Amendment Act, 2025, as a valid, lawful exercise of legislative power, the Centre on Friday filed its reply in the Supreme Court and requested it to dismiss the batch of petitions challenging the act's constitutional validity.
"It is a settled position in law that constitutional courts would not stay a statutory provision, either directly or indirectly, and will decide the matter finally," said the Centre, in its reply filed before the top court.
The Centre filed the reply after complying with the top court's order asking it to do so.
A three-judge bench of the apex court, led by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sanjiv Khanna and including Justices Sanjay Kumar and K V Viswanathan, is scheduled to hear the batch of pleas challenging the Waqf Amendment Act on May 5.
The Centre said that after 2013, there was an addition of over 20 lakh hectares (precisely 20,92,072.536) in waqf land.
"For the last 100 years, waqf by user is recognised only upon registration and not by word of mouth. Hence, the amendment was in sync with consistent practice. There will be maximum of two non-Muslims among 22 members in the Waqf Council and Aukaf Boards, a measure that is representative of inclusiveness and not intrusive of the administration of waqfs," the Centre said.
The affidavit added that the identification of government land deliberately or wrongly mentioned as waqf properties is to set the revenue records right and that government land cannot be treated as land belonging to any religious community.
The Centre, in its 1,332-page preliminary counter affidavit, submitted that there cannot be a "blanket stay" on the law as there was a "presumption of its constitutionality".