Digital Registration, Judicial Deference, and the Constitutional Stakes of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025: The Supreme Court’s Refusal to Extend the UMEED Portal Deadline
By Guru Legal
Keywords: Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025; Section 3B; Section 36(10); UMEED portal; Waqf Tribunal; mandatory registration; waqf by user; Article 25; Article 26; Article 14; Supreme Court of India; religious endowment; minority rights; digital governance; access to courts; All India Muslim Personal Law Board; sufficient cause
Abstract
The Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 (hereinafter, the Waqf Amendment Act or the Act), which came into force on the eighth day of April 2025, introduced sweeping reforms to the legislative framework governing waqf properties in India, amending the Waqf Act, 1995 (hereinafter, the principal Act) in several significant respects. The most immediately contentious feature of the Act for the purposes of the present article is Section 3B, which mandates the mandatory digital registration of all waqf properties on the UMEED portal within six months of the Act’s commencement, and Section 36(10), which bars unregistered waqfs from instituting any suit, appeal, or other legal proceeding for the enforcement of any right after the expiry of the registration deadline. On the first day of December 2025, a bench of the Supreme Court of India comprising Justices Dipankar Datta and Augustine George Masih declined to extend the six-month registration deadline of the sixth day of December 2025, holding that a statutory remedy already existed in the form of applications to the Waqf Tribunals under the proviso to Section 3B, and that waqf managers seeking additional time must approach the appropriate Tribunal individually upon a showing of sufficient cause rather than seeking a blanket extension from the Supreme Court. The ruling raises profound questions about the adequacy of the statutory framework for the protection of waqf properties, the constitutional validity of Section 36(10)’s bar on access to courts, and the broader constitutional challenge to the Waqf Amendment Act, 2025 on grounds of religious freedom under Articles 25 and 26 and equality under Article 14 of the Constitution of India, 1950 (hereinafter, the Constitution). This article analyses these questions and advances recommendations for legislative and institutional reform.
Introduction
The institution of waqf, a form of Islamic religious endowment under which a Muslim dedicates property for a religious or charitable purpose, occupies a position of considerable legal and social significance in India. According to data presented before the Supreme Court of India in the course of the writ petitions challenging the Waqf Amendment Act, 2025, there are approximately 8.72 to 8.8 lakh waqf properties across India, encompassing an estimated 39 lakh acres of land, representing approximately five per cent of India’s total land area. These properties include mosques, dargahs, graveyards, educational institutions, and charitable trusts that provide services to millions of beneficiaries, a significant proportion of whom belong to the economically marginalised sections of the Muslim community. The governance of waqf properties has been regulated in India since the enactment of the Mussalman Wakf Act, 1923, and subsequently by the Wakf Act, 1954 and the Waqf Act, 1995, which established the State Waqf Boards and the Central Waqf Council as the principal regulatory authorities for waqf properties.
The Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025, passed by Parliament on the fourth day of April 2025, represents the most extensive legislative intervention in the regulation of waqf properties since the enactment of the Waqf Act, 1995. The Amendment Act introduced, inter alia, three major changes of constitutional significance: the mandatory digital registration of all waqf properties on the UMEED portal within six months of commencement under Section 3B; the abolition of the doctrine of waqf by user, under which properties had been designated as waqf on the basis of long-standing religious use, affecting an estimated 4.02 lakh properties; and the requirement that Waqf Boards include representation of non-Muslim minorities, constituting a fundamental restructuring of the governance of the institution. The constitutional challenges to these provisions, filed by the All India Muslim Personal Law Board and other petitioners before the Supreme Court of India, remain pending adjudication.
The Supreme Court’s order of the first day of December 2025, declining to extend the mandatory registration deadline, must be understood in the context of this broader constitutional challenge to the Waqf Amendment Act, 2025. The order reflects a careful judicial distinction between the constitutional validity of the registration requirement itself, which the Court declined to stay, and the constitutional challenges to other provisions of the Act, including the five-year practising Muslim requirement under Section 3(r) for the creation of a valid waqf, which the Court had stayed in an earlier interim order of the fifteenth day of September 2025. This distinction is significant: by declining to extend the registration deadline while simultaneously maintaining the constitutional challenge to other provisions, the Court has signalled that it regards mandatory digital registration as a constitutionally permissible regulatory measure, even as it acknowledges the existence of serious constitutional questions regarding other aspects of the Amendment Act.
The Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025: Section 3B, the UMEED Portal, and the Statutory Framework for Mandatory Registration
Section 3B of the Waqf Act, 1995, as inserted by the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025, mandates that every waqf must upload the details of its properties to the UMEED portal within six months of the commencement of the Amendment Act, being by the sixth day of December 2025. The provision further contains a proviso empowering the Waqf Tribunal to grant an extension of time, not exceeding six months, upon an application showing sufficient cause for the failure to comply with the registration requirement within the prescribed period. Section 36(10) of the Waqf Act, 1995, as amended, provides that after the expiry of the registration deadline, no suit, appeal, or other legal proceeding for the enforcement of any right shall be maintainable on behalf of any unregistered waqf, effectively denying unregistered waqfs access to the civil courts and the Waqf Tribunals for the protection of their properties.
The constitutional and practical difficulties created by the mandatory registration framework under Sections 3B and 36(10) are considerable. The UMEED portal, which is the designated platform for the upload of waqf property details, was launched only on the sixth day of June 2025, approximately two months after the commencement of the Amendment Act, and the implementation rules under the Act were notified only in July 2025, compressing the effective compliance window to approximately four to five months rather than the six months nominally prescribed by Section 3B. Petitioners before the Supreme Court represented that as of the first day of December 2025, only 1,16,600 properties had been registered on the UMEED portal, representing approximately thirteen per cent of the total number of waqf properties, against the government’s claim of ninety-nine per cent digitisation, a discrepancy that the petitioners attributed to technical difficulties with the portal, the absence of internet connectivity in remote areas, and the incomplete digitisation of historical waqf records.
The practical consequence of Section 36(10), as the petitioners sought to impress upon the Supreme Court, is that the approximately 7.6 lakh waqf properties that had not been registered on the UMEED portal as of the first day of December 2025 would, upon the expiry of the registration deadline, be rendered legally defenceless against adverse possession, government acquisition, or encroachment, with no access to the civil courts or Waqf Tribunals for the enforcement of their rights. The Supreme Court, in declining to extend the deadline, held that the statutory remedy of application to the Waqf Tribunal under the proviso to Section 3B was adequate to address the concerns of individual waqfs that were unable to register by the sixth day of December 2025, and that the filing of such an application would have the effect of freezing the deadline for that applicant pending the Tribunal’s determination of the application.
Constitutional Challenges: Articles 14, 25, and 26 and the Validity of the Waqf Amendment Act, 2025
The Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 is constitutionally challenged before the Supreme Court of India on several grounds, of which the most significant for present purposes are the challenges under Articles 14, 25, and 26 of the Constitution of India, 1950. Article 25 guarantees to all persons the freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practise, and propagate religion, subject to public order, morality, health, and the other provisions of Part III of the Constitution. Article 26 guarantees to every religious denomination or any section thereof the right to establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes, to manage its own affairs in matters of religion, to own and acquire movable and immovable property, and to administer such property in accordance with law. These rights, while subject to the regulatory authority of the State, are fundamental in character and impose important limitations upon the extent to which the State may intervene in the management and administration of religious endowments.
The challenge under Articles 25 and 26 focuses upon three provisions of the Amendment Act: the abolition of the doctrine of waqf by user under Section 3(r), which requires that the person creating a waqf must have been practising Islam for a period of not less than five years prior to the creation of the waqf; the requirement of non-Muslim representation on the Waqf Boards; and the mandatory registration requirement under Section 3B. The petitioners contend that the abolition of waqf by user would effectively extinguish the waqf character of approximately 4.02 lakh properties that have been designated as waqf on the basis of long-standing religious use, many of which are historically significant mosques, dargahs, and graveyards, a consequence that they characterise as an unconstitutional interference with the religious denomination’s right to administer its properties under Article 26. The Supreme Court, in its interim order of September 2025, stayed the five-year practising Muslim requirement under Section 3(r), acknowledging that it raised a prima facie case of unconstitutional discrimination.
The challenge under Article 14 raises the question of whether the provisions of the Waqf Amendment Act, 2025 that are uniquely applicable to waqf, a Muslim religious institution, reflect an intelligible differentia and a rational nexus to a legitimate State objective, or whether they constitute arbitrary and discriminatory treatment of Muslim religious endowments as compared with Hindu religious endowments governed by State-specific Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments Acts. The petitioners contend that the legislative framework applicable to Hindu religious trusts and endowments does not contain analogous provisions for mandatory digital registration within prescribed timeframes, non-Hindu board representation, or the abolition of long-standing religious use as a basis for endowment status, and that the differential treatment of Muslim religious endowments is accordingly arbitrary and violative of Article 14.
Consequences and Implications for Waqf Governance, Property Rights, and Minority Institutions
The consequences of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 and the Supreme Court’s order of the first day of December 2025 for the governance of waqf properties and the rights of the Muslim minority community in India are far-reaching. The most immediate consequence of the Court’s refusal to extend the registration deadline is that the burden of seeking extensions falls upon each of the approximately 7.6 lakh unregistered waqfs individually, through applications to the State Waqf Tribunals. Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the petitioners, had warned the Court that up to ten lakh mutawallis would need to file individual Tribunal applications, a volume that would be entirely disproportionate to the institutional capacity of the Waqf Tribunals across India, many of which are already overburdened and understaffed. The Court’s response, that it was for the Tribunals to decide on a case-by-case basis, reflects judicial deference to statutory language that may be difficult to translate into practical relief for a large number of unregistered waqfs.
The broader constitutional concern raised by Section 36(10) of the Waqf Act, 1995 as amended is the compatibility of its bar on access to courts for unregistered waqfs with the constitutional guarantee of access to justice under Article 21 of the Constitution. The Supreme Court of India has, in a long line of decisions, recognised that the right of access to courts is an essential incident of the right to life and personal liberty under Article 21, and that any statutory provision that effectively denies a person or institution the ability to seek judicial protection of their rights must satisfy the standards of reasonableness and proportionality established by the Court in its Article 21 jurisprudence. The bar imposed by Section 36(10) upon the legal proceedings of unregistered waqfs is absolute in terms and applies regardless of the reason for the failure to register, raising a substantial constitutional question about its proportionality and its consistency with the guarantee of access to justice.
The Case for Reform: Legislative and Institutional Recommendations
The first area of reform concerns the amendment of Section 3B of the Waqf Act, 1995 to introduce a more realistic and graduated registration timeline, taking into account the practical difficulties of registering a large number of historically significant and geographically dispersed waqf properties on a digital portal within a compressed timeframe. It is submitted that the registration deadline ought to be extended by at least twelve months from the date of commencement of the Amendment Act, that the implementation rules ought to have been notified before or simultaneously with the commencement of the Act rather than two months thereafter, and that the UMEED portal ought to have been developed and tested over a longer period and in consultation with waqf managers and mutawallis before being designated as the sole platform for mandatory registration.
The second area of reform pertains to the constitutional validity and proportionality of Section 36(10) of the Waqf Act, 1995 as amended, which bars unregistered waqfs from any access to the courts or Waqf Tribunals after the expiry of the registration deadline. It is submitted that this provision, in its absolute and unqualified form, is inconsistent with the right of access to courts under Article 21 of the Constitution and with the principles of proportionality and reasonableness established by the Supreme Court in its fundamental rights jurisprudence. Parliament ought to amend Section 36(10) to introduce a proportionate and graduated consequence for failure to register, such as a prohibition on the initiation of new proceedings rather than a bar on all existing and future proceedings, with provision for the lifting of the bar upon belated registration subject to such conditions as the Waqf Tribunal may impose.
The third area of reform concerns the institutional capacity of the Waqf Tribunals to handle the large volume of extension applications that will be generated by the Supreme Court’s order of the first day of December 2025 directing individual waqfs to seek relief from the Tribunals. It is submitted that the Central Government ought to immediately constitute additional benches of the Waqf Tribunals in every State, and provide the existing Tribunals with the personnel, infrastructure, and financial resources necessary to dispose of extension applications within a period of thirty days of receipt. The failure to provide adequate Tribunal capacity would effectively nullify the statutory remedy that the Supreme Court found to be adequate grounds for declining to extend the deadline.
The fourth area of reform addresses the need for a constitutionally sound framework for the mandatory digital registration of religious endowments that applies uniformly to all categories of religious trusts and endowments, including Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowments, irrespective of the religion of their founders or beneficiaries. It is submitted that the Parliament ought to enact a comprehensive Religious Endowments (Digital Registration and Transparency) Act that applies uniformly to all religious endowments in India, including waqfs, Hindu temples and maths, Sikh gurudwaras, and Christian church properties, prescribing a mandatory registration framework that is non-discriminatory, technically accessible, and accompanied by adequate institutional support for registration compliance.
The fifth area of reform pertains to the resolution of the pending constitutional challenge to the Waqf Amendment Act, 2025 before the Supreme Court of India. It is submitted that the expeditious determination of the constitutional challenge is of the utmost importance for the governance of waqf properties and the protection of the rights of the Muslim minority community in India. The Supreme Court ought to constitute a five-judge constitutional bench to hear the challenge at the earliest opportunity, and ought to provide comprehensive interim relief pending the constitutional determination to prevent the irreversible loss of the waqf character of properties that may be affected by the abolition of the doctrine of waqf by user under Section 3(r) of the Amendment Act.
Conclusion
The Supreme Court of India’s refusal on the first day of December 2025 to extend the mandatory registration deadline under Section 3B of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 reflects a measured exercise of judicial deference to statutory language, grounded in the Court’s finding that an adequate statutory remedy already existed in the form of individual applications to the Waqf Tribunals. The ruling is, however, only the most immediate manifestation of a constitutional controversy of considerable depth and consequence, involving fundamental questions about the compatibility of the Waqf Amendment Act, 2025 with the constitutional guarantees of religious freedom under Articles 25 and 26, equality under Article 14, and access to courts under Article 21 of the Constitution of India, 1950. It is submitted that the full constitutional response to this controversy requires not only the expeditious resolution of the pending constitutional challenge before the Supreme Court but also the legislative and institutional reforms recommended in this article, reforms directed at ensuring that the mandatory registration framework for waqf properties is constitutionally sound, practically accessible, and institutionally supported in a manner that protects rather than undermines the rights of one of India’s largest categories of religious endowments and their beneficiaries.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Q1. What is the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025, and what are its principal changes to the existing waqf framework?
The Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 (Act No. 12 of 2025), which came into force on the eighth day of April 2025, amends the Waqf Act, 1995 in several significant respects. The principal changes introduced by the Amendment Act include: the mandatory digital registration of all waqf properties on the UMEED portal within six months of commencement under Section 3B, with Section 36(10) providing that unregistered waqfs shall lose all access to courts after the registration deadline; the abolition of the doctrine of waqf by user, affecting an estimated 4.02 lakh properties that had been designated as waqf on the basis of long-standing religious use; and the introduction of non-Muslim minority representation on the Waqf Boards across all States, constituting a fundamental restructuring of the governance of the waqf institution. The Amendment Act is constitutionally challenged before the Supreme Court of India on grounds of violation of Articles 14, 25, and 26 of the Constitution of India, 1950.
Q2. What legal remedy is available to a waqf that was unable to register on the UMEED portal by the sixth day of December 2025?
A waqf that was unable to register on the UMEED portal by the sixth day of December 2025 may apply to the appropriate State Waqf Tribunal under the proviso to Section 3B of the Waqf Act, 1995 as amended, seeking an extension of time upon a showing of sufficient cause for the failure to comply with the registration requirement within the prescribed period. The Supreme Court of India, in its order of the first day of December 2025, held that the filing of such an application would have the effect of freezing the deadline for the applying waqf pending the Tribunal’s determination, thereby preventing the operation of the bar under Section 36(10) in the interim. The Tribunal is empowered to grant an extension of time of up to six months, being until the sixth day of June 2026. Grounds of sufficient cause may include technical failures of the UMEED portal, the absence of internet connectivity in remote areas, incomplete digitisation of historical waqf records, and ongoing boundary or title disputes in respect of waqf properties.
Q3. What is the consequence for a waqf that fails to register and does not file a Tribunal application before the registration deadline?
A waqf that fails to register on the UMEED portal by the sixth day of December 2025 and does not file an application before the State Waqf Tribunal for an extension of time before that date will, pursuant to Section 36(10) of the Waqf Act, 1995 as amended, lose all access to the courts and Waqf Tribunals for the enforcement of any right on behalf of the waqf. The bar imposed by Section 36(10) is absolute in its terms and provides that no suit, appeal, or other legal proceeding for the enforcement of any right shall be maintainable on behalf of any unregistered waqf after the expiry of the registration deadline. This means that an unregistered waqf would be unable to resist adverse possession claims, challenge government acquisition of its properties, or seek any other judicial protection of its rights until it achieves registration on the UMEED portal and the bar under Section 36(10) is accordingly lifted.
Q4. What obligation does the State bear in relation to the protection of waqf properties and the rights of the Muslim minority community under the Constitution of India, 1950?
The State bears obligations under the Constitution of India, 1950 to protect the rights of religious minorities, including the Muslim community, in the management and administration of their religious endowments. Article 26 of the Constitution guarantees every religious denomination the right to establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes, to manage its own affairs in matters of religion, and to administer its properties in accordance with law. The State’s legislative power to regulate religious endowments is accordingly constrained by the constitutional requirement that such regulation must not unconstitutionally interfere with the essential religious character of the institution or deprive the denomination of its right to manage its religious affairs. The State is further obliged under Article 14 of the Constitution to ensure that any regulatory framework applicable to religious endowments is non-discriminatory and applies equally to all categories of religious trusts and endowments, regardless of the religion of their founders or beneficiaries.
Q5. What are the constitutional grounds on which the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 is being challenged before the Supreme Court of India?
The Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 is being challenged before the Supreme Court of India on multiple constitutional grounds. The principal grounds of challenge are as follows. First, it is contended that the Act violates Article 25 of the Constitution of India, 1950, which guarantees the freedom of religion, and Article 26, which guarantees the right of religious denominations to manage their own affairs in matters of religion and to administer their properties. Second, it is contended that the abolition of the doctrine of waqf by user and the introduction of non-Muslim representation on the Waqf Boards constitute unconstitutional interference with the Muslim religious denomination’s right to manage its religious and charitable institutions. Third, it is contended that the differential legislative treatment of waqfs as compared with Hindu religious and charitable endowments violates the right to equality under Article 14 of the Constitution. Fourth, the five-year practising Muslim requirement for the creation of a valid waqf under Section 3(r) of the Amendment Act has been stayed by the Supreme Court in its interim order of September 2025 as raising a prima facie case of unconstitutional discrimination.
Bibliography
Primary Sources
– Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025 (Act No. 12 of 2025), Sections 3B, 3(r), and 36(10).
– Waqf Act, 1995 (Act No. 43 of 1995).
– Constitution of India, 1950, Articles 14, 21, 25, 26, and 32.
– Supreme Court of India, Interim Order, Writ Petition (Civil) No. 276 of 2025, dated 15 September 2025.
– Supreme Court of India, Order dated 1 December 2025, declining extension of UMEED portal registration deadline (Justices Dipankar Datta and Augustine George Masih).
– Mussalman Wakf Act, 1923 (Act No. 42 of 1923).
– Wakf Act, 1954 (Act No. 29 of 1954).
– S.R. Bommai v. Union of India, (1994) 3 SCC 1 (Supreme Court of India).
– Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India, (1978) 1 SCC 248 (Supreme Court of India).
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– Saumya Saxena, ‘Waqf Law and Constitutional Challenges in India’ (2023) 59(2) Journal of the Indian Law Institute 198.
– Rajeev Bhargava, ‘Secularism and the Law of Religious Endowments in India’ (2021) 56(3) Economic and Political Weekly 42.
– LiveLaw, Supreme Court Asks Waqfs To Approach Tribunals To Extend Time, LiveLaw Media, 30 November 2025.
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