Supreme Court refuses to entertain fresh plea challenging Waqf (Amendment) Act

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain a fresh plea challenging constitutional validity of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025.

A bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justices Sanjay Kumar and K V Viswanathan is scheduled to hear petitions on the issue on May 5. The bench, which had earlier made it clear it will hear only five of the over 70 litigants, today again said that no more fresh pleas will be entertained on the issue.

“If you have some additional grounds, you can file an intervention application,” the CJI told the counsel for petitioner Mohammad Sultan.

On April 29, the bench refused to entertain 13 petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the Act.

“We are not going to increase the number of petitions now… This will keep on piling and would become difficult to handle,” it said.

On April 17, the bench decided to hear only five of the pleas before it and titled the case: "In Re: Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025". The Centre then assured the bench it will neither denotify waqf properties, including "waqf by user", nor make any appointments to the central waqf council and boards till May 5.

About 72 petitions were filed against the law. They included those by AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi, All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB), Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and Congress MPs Imran Pratapgarhi and Mohammad Jawed.

While appointing three lawyers as nodal counsel, the bench asked the advocates to decide among themselves who was going to argue.

"We clarify that the next hearing (May 5) will be for the preliminary objections and for an interim order," the bench said.

The Centre recently notified the Act, which got President Droupadi Murmu's assent on April 5, after its passage in Parliament following heated debates in both houses.

The bill was passed in the Rajya Sabha with 128 members voting in favour and 95 opposing it. It was cleared by the Lok Sabha with 288 members supporting it and 232 against it.