Draft report ready, says Waqf panel head; Opposition seeks deadline extension

The chairman of the Joint Committee of Parliament scrutinising the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, Jagdambika Pal, said on Thursday that the panel’s draft report is ready amid opposition members’ demand for an extension of its November 29 deadline for more deliberations.

“Our draft report is ready. We will soon give a date for clause by clause discussion on its recommendations,” Pal told reporters after an almost six-hour meeting of the committee during which the Minority Affairs ministry presented a detailed justification for the amendments proposed by the government in the Waqf Act.

Opposition members will meet Speaker Om Birla on November 25, the first day of Parliament’s winter session, to push for their demand for an extension. They said they need more time to raise questions and seek clarifications.

Pal said the committee has engaged in an exhaustive deliberation with a gamut of stakeholders, and all its members were allowed opportunity to pose questions and seek replies as he suggested that all that is left now is for the panel to discuss the draft report.

“I hope there will be a consensus,” he said, a possibility highly unlikely due to opposition members’ relentless objections to a host of the bill’s proposals, with the proposed law seen by them as part of the BJP-led government’s political agenda.

Sources, however, did not rule out the possibility of a short extension to the committee, noting that it may be required even to complete the formalities of preparing its voluminous report and before it is discussed in the meeting.

MPs from the Congress, TMC, DMK, Aam Aadmi Party and the AIMIM have repeatedly questioned Pal’s choice of stakeholders, and have even complained to the Speaker over his unilateral conduct and alleged implementation of the government’s agenda.

Pal, a seasoned parliamentarian from the BJP, has dismissed the charges, asserting that he has allowed every stakeholder and all opposition MPs to record their views.

He said if opposition MPs wanted to meet Birla, it is their right. The Speaker had constituted the committee, and whatever he decides will be acceptable to all, he added.

The Minority Affairs ministry has deposed before the committee for nearly 29 hours through five days, and nearly 1,000 slides covering the members’ views and the ministry’s replies and stand have been prepared, Pal said, rebutting the opposition’s charge of inadequate deliberations.

The panel has held 25 sittings and travelled many states, he added.

A BJP member of the committee said around 146 organisations deposed before the committee which received over 95.86 lakh suggestions through various means, including e-mail.

Earlier, at the committee’s meeting Pal said it will be the last sitting before the draft is discussed, drawing protests from opposition members, who began raising slogans. Some of them got in touch with the Speaker’s office to seek his intervention.                    The committee has been asked by the Lok Sabha to submit its report on the last day of the first week of the winter session of Parliament beginning Monday.

The government has already listed the Waqf (Amendment) Bill for consideration and passage in the Winter session “after the report of the joint committee is presented to the Lok Sabha”.

In the past too, opposition members on the panel have accused Pal, a BJP MP, of doing the government’s bidding. They had earlier even threatened to disassociate themselves with the panel’s work.

Their main concern was the frequent day-long meetings of the panel which did not allow them to prepare adequately and had accused Pal of “bulldozing proceedings” by not consulting them in picking on whom to call to depose.