Supreme Court to hear on May 20 question of interim relief in pleas against Waqf Act

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday said it will hear arguments on May 20 on the issue of considering interim relief on pleas challenging the validity of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025. The court also clarified it will not consider any plea for putting on hold provisions of the earlier 1995 Waqf law on the next date of hearing.

A bench of Chief Justice of India B R Gavai and Justice Augustine George Masih said the court will hear the arguments, the entire day, for and against the interim order putting on hold the provisions of the Act.   

The bench asked senior advocate Kapil Sibal, representing the petitioners challenging the validity of the law, and Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the Centre, to file their written notes by May 19. 

Both senior counsel suggested that the hearing can be fixed for next week, which would provide sufficient time to the judges to go through the case papers.

During the hearing, advocate Vishnu Shankar Jain, representing a party, submitted before the bench that earlier he had challenged provisions of the Waqf Act 1995.

Jain said, in the fresh plea, his clients have challenged various provisions of the Waqf Amendment Act 2025 and his clients are also aggrieved by certain provisions of the Waqf Act 1995, as amended in 2025, and requested the bench to give him 30 minutes to make submissions. 

The bench asked Jain, what is your grievance? Jain replied that the Waqf tribunal, which is unconstitutional, is still there and there are various other sections which are draconian and they still exist on the statute. 

“They existed since when," the court asked Jain, who said since 1995 and also in 2025. 

The bench said, "if they have existed since 1995, and not been challenged…and if they were challenged then when?”

Jain said the 1995 Act was challenged earlier and the apex court told them to the high court and added, “we filed 140 petitions which are pending in different high courts and now we have filed the present writ petition, which is a fresh matter….”. 

The bench asked how the court can permit to raise the challenge of the 1995 Act in 2025. The bench said it will not consider any plea for putting on hold on provisions of the earlier 1995 Waqf law, when the court takes up the matter on May 20.

“We will not consider any request for stay of any provision of the 1995 Act; we are making it clear. Just because somebody is trying to make a challenge to the amendment of 2025 and somebody just wants to jump and challenge the 1995 Act, that will not be permitted," the bench said.

Mehta said Jain wants to say that he has been waiting for that stay since long but this court directed his clients to go to the high court and never considered the prayer regarding 1995 Act. After hearing submissions, the bench asked the lawyers to come prepared, and submit a consolidated note of their submissions to ensure that the case is not adjourned on May 20.

The matter was earlier considered by a bench of then CJI Sanjiv Khanna and Justices Sanjay Kumar and K V Vishwanathan.

On April 17, the apex court refused to put on hold the recently made changes to the Waqf law, after the central government assured it that no recruitment would be made to Waqf boards and councils, and also the Waqf properties declared or registered as Waqf by users would not be de-notified till the next date of hearing.

On April 25, the Union Ministry of Minority Affairs filed a preliminary affidavit defending the amended Waqf Act of 2025. The Centre had opposed any blanket stay by the court on a law having a presumption of constitutionality passed by Parliament.

The Supreme Court had said only five petitions will be treated as lead petition in the matter The apex court said the other writ petitions will be treated as intervention applications. Over 100 petitions have been filed against the Act so far.