Letters from hundreds of Muslim widows triggered waqf reforms, says PM Modi
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday said that letters from hundreds of Muslim widows led.
The Centre to take up the task of reforming the management of waqf properties. He said had waqf assets been managed well, Muslim youths “wouldn’t have been fixing punctures of bicycle tyres” to eke out a living.
The PM’s statement came at a rally in Hisar, Haryana, even as violent protests rocked West Bengal, leading to the deployment of central forces.
Modi’s remarks come less than a week after the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025, came into force. The government notified the law on April 8, after President Droupadi Murmu gave her assent to the proposed law on April 5. The Parliament passed it on April 4.
Addressing a rally in Hisar, PM Modi said waqf properties had been misused for decades, benefiting land mafia, instead of poor Muslims.
“It was only after hundreds of widowed Muslim women wrote to the Government of India that the issue was even discussed, and eventually, the law was changed,” said PM Modi.
“Now, the exploitation of the poor is finally going to stop. Had that money been used honestly from the beginning, my young Muslim youth wouldn’t have had to spend their lives repairing bicycle punctures,” he added.
PM Modi’s remarks revealed that the complaints over land being claimed as waqf property were not only from non-Muslims but also from poor Muslims.
POOR MUSLIMS WILL BENEFIT FROM NEW WAQF LAW: PM MODI
“According to the new Waqf law, land or property owned by any Adivasi cannot be appropriated by the Waqf Board. Poor and Pasmanda Muslims will benefit,” he added.
These remarks came as PM Modi marked Ambedkar Jayanti by laying the foundation of the Maharaja Agrasen Airport in Hisar, Haryana, and inaugurating the first flight to Ayodhya.
Modi also attacked Congress leaders, calling them “vote bank hungry politicians.” He questioned why Congress had never appointed a Muslim as its party chief.
“If you truly have even a little sympathy for Muslims in your heart, then why doesn’t the Congress party make a Muslim the party president? Why don’t they do it?” he asked.
He even called Congress a destroyer of the Constitution.
“The Congress has become the destroyer of the Constitution. Dr BR Ambedkar wanted to bring in equality, but the Congress spread the virus of vote-bank politics. Babasaheb wanted every poor, every backward person to be able to live with dignity, to hold their head high, to have dreams, and to fulfil them,” said PM Modi.
Even as the BJP tried to woo women as a separate voter base, it brought in a law banning the practice of instant triple talaq in 2019. That was seen as an attempt to woo the votes of Muslim women voters.
“The BJP government has ended the evil practice of [instant] triple talaq. We have enacted a strong law in the interest of crores of Muslim sisters and protected their families,” Modi said in April last year at an election rally in UP’s Saharanpur.
The PM’s mention of letters from hundreds of Muslim widows being the trigger for the new waqf law emphasises that focus. It also reveals that there were complaints from Muslims over the grabbing of land in the name of waqf property.