Supreme Court - Daily Orders
M. Syed Ibrahim Moosa vs The Tamil Nadu Wakf Board on 1 September, 2025
ITEM NO.30 COURT NO.15 SECTION XII
S U P R E M E C O U R T O F I N D I A
RECORD OF PROCEEDINGS
Petition(s) for Special Leave to Appeal (C) No(s). 24178/2025
[Arising out of impugned final judgment and order dated 04-08-2025
in WAMD No. 2122/2023 passed by the High Court of Judicature at
Madras at Madurai]
M. SYED IBRAHIM MOOSA Petitioner(s)
VERSUS
THE TAMIL NADU WAKF BOARD & ORS. Respondent(s)
IA No. 210244/2025 - EXEMPTION FROM FILING C/C OF THE IMPUGNED
JUDGMENT
IA No. 210245/2025 - EXEMPTION FROM FILING O.T. Date : 01-09-2025 This matter was called on for hearing today. CORAM :
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE MANOJ MISRA HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE UJJAL BHUYAN For Petitioner(s) :
Mr. Nikhil Goel, Sr. Adv. Mr. Haris Beeran, Adv. Mr. Azhar Assees, Adv. Mr. Anand B. Menon, Adv. Mr. Radha Shyam Jena, AOR For Respondent(s) : Mr. A Velan , AOR MR v Balaji, Adv.
Mr Arun Kumar Manji , Adv Mr Jeevan Kumar, Adv. MR Shashank Tripathi, AOR UPON hearing the counsel the Court made the following O R D E R Signature Not Verified
1. Digitally signed by babita pandey Date: 2025.09.02
The contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner, 16:04:58 IST Reason:
inter alia, is that the dispute relates to the conduct of election to Jamia Masjid Wakf. Earlier, in Writ Petition (MD) No. 19028/2022, a direction was issued on 01.09.2022 to conduct election within three months and to form a new committee so as to take control of the administration of the Wakf concerned. This was challenged before Division Bench of the High Court vide WA (MD) No. 1124/22 which was disposed of by observing that the election officer shall conduct election to Jamia Masjid Wakf, strictly adhering to the schemes/ by- law of the Wakf within a period of three months. In the interregnum, before the election could be held, the Wakf Board, exercising its power under Section 69(4) of the Wakf Act, 1995 modified the scheme and a new scheme was put in place in the year 2023. A fresh Writ Petition was filed impugning the scheme. In that Writ Petition, learned Single Judge of the High Court, in paragraph 16 of his judgment, issued following directions:
“16. For the reasons and observations stated supra, this Court is passing the following order:
i. The impugned resolution dated 21.12.2022 and the impugned Gazette publication of scheme dated 15.03.2023 are hereby quashed.
ii. The Jamia Masjid Wakf shall brought under direct management of Wakf Board forthwith.
iii. The Wakf Board shall conduct
election based on the scheme dated
13.02.2019
iv. The Wakf Board shall conduct
election based on the finalized voter list.
v. The election shall be completed within a period of two (2) months from the date of receipt of the copy of the order.
vi. One the new management has taken charge, the new management shall conduct a general body meeting to solve the issue whether the Jamia Masjid Wakf needs demarcation, whether the number of executive members ought to be revised and any other issues etc. vii. If no consensus is arrived in the general body meeting, then the parties are at liberty to approach appropriate forum to divide, to demarcate and to increase or reduce the number of executive members of the Jamia Masjid Mahalla and other Mahallas in accordance to law.”
2. Aggrieved by the said direction, a Writ Appeal was filed before the Division Bench. The Division Bench, by the impugned order, set aside clause (i) and clause (vi) of the aforesaid directions and upheld clauses (ii), (iii), (iv) and (v).
3. The submission of the petitioner is two-fold. First, that once the Division Bench came to the conclusion that the original petitioners ought to have filed a petition before the Wakf Tribunal, the writ petition ought to have been dismissed on that very ground and the direction issued by the learned Single Judge ought to have been set aside in toto. Second, the power of the Wakf Board under sub-Section (4) of Section 69 to cancel or modify the scheme before or after the scheme has come into effect is not circumscribed by any limitation. In such circumstances, once the scheme is re-framed in exercise of the aforesaid power, the old scheme stand substituted and cannot be applied. Therefore, direction to hold election in terms of the earlier scheme is not legally justified.
4. Issue notice, returnable in four weeks.
5. Notice on behalf of Respondent No 1 has been accepted by Ms Astha Tyagi, Advocate and notice on behalf of Respondent No 4 has been accepted by Mr Shashank Tripathi, AOR.
6. In the meantime, the effect and operation of the order of the High Court directing election/constitution of the new committee as per the 2019 Scheme shall remain stayed.
(CHETAN ARORA) (SAPNA BANSAL) ASTT. REGISTRAR-cum-PS COURT MASTER (NSH)