The Supreme Court has ruled that a Muslim member of a State Bar Council, appointed to the State Waqf Board, could not continue as a member of the Board on expiry of his tenure in the Bar Council.
The Bench of Justice MM Sundresh and Justice Rajesh Bindal on Tuesday observed that eligibility to the Waqf Board under Section 14(1)(b)(iii) of the Waqf Act, 1995 flew directly from the individual’s status as a Muslim member of the bar council and ended with it.
Overruling a Manipur High Court order, which allowed a former Bar Council member to retain his seat on the Board despite demitting the bar council, the top court of the country said that without such membership in the Parliament, the State Legislative Assembly or the Bar Council, the very basis for their membership in the Board ceased to exist.
The matter pertained to a dispute between Firoz Ahmad Khalid and Rabi Khan over membership in the State Waqf Board.
In February 2023, the Manipur government appointed Khalid to the Board after his election to the Bar Council, replacing Khan, whose term had ended.
While a single-judge Bench of the High Court dismissed the challenge to this appointment, a Division Bench reversed that ruling, holding that Explanation II to Section 14 only required sitting MPs and MLAs to vacate Waqf Board posts upon expiry of their tenures, and made no such mention of Bar Council members.
The Apex Court ruled that Explanation II to Section 14(1)(b) of the 1995 Act did not explicitly mention that the term of a Muslim member of the Bar Council in the Board was also co-terminus with their term in the Bar Council. This must be understood to be implied upon a reading of the provision as a whole, it added.
The Bench, however, clarified that where there were no Muslim members in any of the three categories mentioned in Section 14(1)(b) of the 1995 Act, ex-Muslim Members of Parliament or State Legislative Assembly or ex-Member of the Bar Council, as the case may be, shall constitute the electoral college.
It said if there was no serving Muslim member in the Bar Council and no senior Muslim advocate was available, only then would an ex-Member of the Bar Council be eligible to be a Member of the Board.
It was axiomatic to state that an existing Muslim Member of the Board from the Bar Council would cease to be a Member of the Board, upon the completion of their tenure as a Member of the Bar Council, when there was another Muslim Member available to replace them from within the Bar Council, noted the Bench.
The Apex Court further held that the Bombay High Court order in Shri Asif S/o Shaukat Qureshi vs State of Maharashtra to permit a former Bar Council member to remain on the Board was not a good law.
It also rejected the argument that Explanation II’s silence implied legislative intent to exclude Bar Council members from its scope.
The Apex Court observed that giving an overreaching interpretation to Explanation II would amount to treating the MPs and MLAs differently from members of the Bar Council. No intelligible differentia was discernible for such a classification from the scheme of the provision, it added.
Restoring the single-judge Bench order, the top court of the country upheld appellant Khalid’s appointment by the State of Manipur.
The post Muslim member cannot continue as State Waqf Board member on expiry of tenure in State Bar Council: Supreme Court appeared first on India Legal.