KOCHI: The High Court on Friday directed the state and Union governments to file a counter affidavit in response to a petition filed by the residents of Munambam challenging certain provisions of the Waqf Act.
The petition was filed by Joseph Benny and seven others from Munambam who had purchased land from the managing committee of Farook College, Kozhikode.
They alleged that the Waqf Board was taking steps to evict them and 600 other families saying the land belonged to it. The revenue officials had refused to mutate land documents at the request of the chief executive officers of the Waqf Board.
According to the petitioners, Section 14 of the Act, which gives power to the Waqf Board to declare properties belonging to any trust or society as its own, was unconstitutional.
“Section 14 went against the principles of natural justice and fair play. It could not be conferred with the jurisdiction to decide on the question of title of land possessed by persons of non-Islamic religion,” the petitioners alleged.
They said the persons in possession of the property declared by the Board as its property are deemed as encroachers and the CEO was given power to take steps to dispossess and harass a lawful owner from his property in violation of Section 300 A of the Constitution.
Every dispute of a civil nature has to be decided by civil courts. As Waqf comes within the ambit of the personal law of a Muslim state, it cannot make any law giving special status and right to a particular religious community, the petitioners contended.