MUMBAI, 8 July 2007 — M.A. Aziz, the chairman of the Maharashtra Waqf Board, yesterday lashed out at Anees Ahmed, the minister of waqf in the Congress-led Democratic Front government in Maharashtra, alleging that Ahmed was trying to settle personal scores with him because Aziz had exposed the minister for his involvement in a land scam in Nagpur.
Aziz said Ahmed was spreading the lie that he had dissolved the Waqf Board. A member of the Waqf Board said that Ahmed was in the habit of creating controversy and has an ego problem, apart from being brash and arrogant.
The chairman of the state Waqf Board, who is embroiled in a controversy over the acquisition of waqf land for a residential complex by industrialist Mukesh Ambani of Reliance Industries, also lashed out at the state government’s intervention in waqf matters and said that the state government had no jurisdiction in the matter.
Aziz has been asked to explain the sale of waqf properties by the revenue and forest department within 15 days. He said that he had replied to the notice, telling the government that waqf-related matters are to be decided by the waqf tribunals only.
Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh has said that the Waqf Board was responsible for the problem, as it had granted a no-objection certificate for the sale of all the five waqf properties in the state.
Islamic scholar Mohammed Wahiuddin said that under waqf laws, once a property is donated to a waqf it cannot be sold to anyone under any circumstances, and even the person who has donated the land to the waqf has no rights on the property. Thus all Waqf land sales are illegal, he said.
