The Muslim leadership striving for the recovery of the encroached Waqf property in Andhra Pradesh achieved a major success on Wednesday as the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy returned 50 acres of prime land to the state Waqf board.
The civic body has won a "historic legal battle" that was going on since 1979, said Mayor Pushyamitra Bhargava.
The meeting of the Joint Committee on Waqf (Amendment) Bill took an ugly turn as the Trinamool Congress MP smashed a glass water bottle and threw it towards panel chairman Jagdambika Pal of the Bharatiya Janata Party during a heated exchange of words with BJP's Abhijit Gangopadhyay, a former Calcutta high court judge.
The parliamentary committee scrutinizing the Waqf (Amendment) Bill has been granted an extension until the last day of the next Budget Session. This decision follows a heated meeting marked by a walkout from opposition members who expressed concerns about the committee's draft report. The committee will visit several states to meet stakeholders and finalize its report.
Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah directed officials on Saturday to immediately retract all notices sent to farmers regarding Waqf land.
Hitting out at the Congress government headed by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, he said the ruling party has reached "height of appeasement politics," and alleged that it has in a way made appeasement of minorities its "goal."
The BJP may be in the Opposition in many states, but nowhere is it as divided as it is in Karnataka, points out Aditi Phadnis.
Several Aam Aadmi Party leaders, including Manish Sisodia and Sanjay Singh, hit out at the BJP government at the Centre, saying agencies are targeting those who raised their voice against the ruling party.
The Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) has shifted its focus back to Hindutva after suffering significant losses in the recent Maharashtra assembly elections. The party has been vocal about attacks on Hindus in Bangladesh and has taken a stance to "protect" a Hanuman Temple in Mumbai. Observers say this move is an attempt to regain its core voter base and counter the BJP's narrative on Hindutva, ahead of the upcoming civic polls. Analysts believe the party's "secular" stand may not be effective in the BMC elections and that its return to Hindutva is a sign of frustration from electoral setbacks.
Hindu outfits that took out a march in Kullu demanding the demolition of the mosque were involved in a scuffle with the police on Monday.
Khan asserted that he will not allow the central government to take over the waqf properties.
Both factions of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind (Arshad Madani and Mahmood Madani) slammed the Bill and expressed grave concerns over the proposed legislation.
A meeting of the joint committee of Parliament on the Waqf (Amendment) Bill on Friday witnessed fireworks with members vociferously opposing certain provisions of the draft legislation, leading to a brief walkout by opposition members.
'There is something in our desh ki mitti that has held us together.'
'So many conquerors, colonisers, cultures came and went, but we withstood them and rose up again.'
He could have blazed a trail that few Indian judges had. It was a missed opportunity of a lifetime, notes Ramesh Menon.
It also cautioned that if the legislation is passed, the "two crutches" on which the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government is running at the Centre would not be able to escape responsibility.
Maharani Lakshmi Bai of Jhansi is a "national hero" and history should not be divided on "communal politics", the Delhi high court said on Wednesday while pulling up the Shahi Idgah managing committee for making "scandalous pleadings" in its plea against installation of her statue inside the Shahi Idgah Park at Sadar Bazar in New Delhi.
The Hindu litigants claim the mosque holds signs suggesting that it was a temple once.
Amid escalating tensions over the Sinjauli mosque in Shimla, a Muslim welfare committee on Thursday urged the municipal commissioner to seal the unauthorised portion and also offered to demolish it in accordance with a court order.
'We will teach them about our idol Mohammad Sahab and all the great men of other religions as well -- about Shri Ram, Krishna, Yeshu, Bhagwan Mahavir.' 'We want children from the madrasas to become doctors, engineers, scientists, soldiers and walk in the footsteps of Dr A P J Abdul Kalam.' 'That is why we have named the modern madrasas after Dr Kalam.'
A court in Baghpat on Monday dismissed a decades-old plea filed by a Muslim side over a site that Hindu devotees say is the Mahabharat-era 'Lakshagriha' but the petitioners maintain is a graveyard and dargah of Sufi saint Sheikh Badruddin.
'Article 370 is now dug 70 feet deep in the ground. It cannot come out.'
The Anti-Corruption Branch on Friday arrested Aam Aadmi Party MLA Amanatullah Khan after conducting raids at premises linked to him in connection with alleged irregularities in the Delhi Waqf Board recruitment, officials said.
Modi can abandon the path of Hindutva only at risk to his position within his own fraternity. But if he pursues a hard line, he faces the risk of being hauled up by his coalition-partners. For the first time in a decade, Modi is not in enviable situation, observes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray chief Uddhav Thackeray on Friday said he will back any candidate announced by the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party-Sharadchandra Pawar as Maha Vikas Aghadi's chief ministerial face.
Here is the chronology of events in the Ayodhya Ram temple issue.
The committee argued that only the Waqf Board has the right to hear any matter pertaining to the mosque.
Aam Aadmi Party MLA Amanatullah Khan, who was arrested on Friday in connection with an alleged corruption case, was sent to a four-day Anti-Corruption Bureau's (ACB) custody for questioning on Saturday.
'People want to do business in the name of the Kedarnath temple.'
The objections against the suit were raised by the management committee of the mosque and the Uttar Pradesh Sunni Central Waqf Board.
Kaushar Imam Siddique alias Laddan, 47, a resident of Jogabai Extension, was wanted in a case of Arms Act registered against him after a country-made pistol and three live rounds were found in his premises, they said.
The minister said considerable tracts of land belonging to the Waqf board had been illegally occupied, but assured that it will be vacated and used to build schools, hospitals and parks.
Delhi Waqf Board chairman Amanatullah Khan in a letter to ASI director general, last week, requested for allowing namaz at the "ancient" Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque in Qutab Minor complex.
The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear an appeal of the Gyanvapi management committee against an Allahabad High Court order which held that lawsuits for "restoration" of a temple where the mosque stands in Varanasi are maintainable.
'They are happy for the Hindu community as Ram Lalla is consecrated in Ayodhya.'
The construction of the three-storeyed Ram temple in Ayodhya will be completed by December this year, temple construction committee chairperson Nripendra Misra said on Thursday. The sprawling temple complex will also have other structures.
With this, the number of suits filed in the Krishna Janmabhoomi-Shahi Idgah case, in different courts of Mathura, has gone up to 15.
The idea is to help madrasa students join the academic mainstream and prepare them for a better future.
The Allahabad high court reserved its judgment on Friday in a petition challenging the maintainability of a suit seeking 'restoration' of a temple at the site of the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi.
Justice Agarwal retired from the high court on April 23, 2020.
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