On August 16, the Jammu and Kashmir Waqf Board issued an order banning “unethical practices” akin to “forcibly” taking donations at shrines.
Such donations, the Waqf Board claimed, have been extracted via “exploitative means” by individuals who have been “completely occupying specific spots throughout the shrines for his or her actions”. It added that there have been situations the place such spots had been “outsourced or contracted out towards receipt of enormous sums of cash”. It was in possession of a “massive variety of complaints” towards such individuals, the Waqf Board claimed.
The Jammu and Kashmir Waqf Board is an administrative physique liable for managing the properties and funds of Islamic establishments, together with Muslim shrines, within the area. The individuals whom it referred to in its order have been “mujavirs”, or caretakers, of such shrines. Most hint their lineages to Sufi saints who introduced Islam to Kashmir centuries in the past. They aren’t formally appointed by any authority however are a everlasting characteristic of Kashmiri shrines, providing prayers on behalf of devotees, normally in change for donations.
Days after the order, Waqf Board officers, together with Jammu and Kashmir police personnel, swooped down on shrines throughout the Valley and confiscated donation bins put in by mujavirs.
The August 16 order is arguably the strictest motion taken by the newly constituted Jammu and Kashmir Waqf Board. Earlier than August 5, 2019, when Jammu and Kashmir misplaced formal autonomy and was break up into two Union Territories, the Waqf had been regulated by the legal guidelines of the previous state.
After August 2019, the previous board was dismantled and reconstituted beneath the central Waqf Act, 1995. Darakhshan Andrabi, a veteran Bharatiya Janata Occasion chief, was appointed as head of the board in March.
Whereas the waqf board claims to be cracking down on corrupt practices, others see it in another way. A political commentator in Srinagar, who didn’t need to be recognized, mentioned the waqf’s “proactiveness” could have been well-intentioned but it surely may imply a tightening of presidency management on Muslim non secular areas within the Valley.
Two units of donation bins
Whereas mujavirs have at all times been casual centres of energy within the shrines, the donation system run by them has been considerably institutionalised over the many years. For instance, it is not uncommon to see two units of donation bins at shrines in Kashmir.
One set of bins is for the Waqf Board; donations listed here are meant for the development and administration of the shrines. For donations made to those bins, devotees are given receipts by waqf board officers posted on the shrines.
The opposite set of bins is for mujavirs. Donations made listed here are domestically generally known as “nazr-o-niyaz”, dedications. This sum is sort of a private charge to the mujavir, who doesn’t problem receipts. This donation could also be used at his discretion, whether or not for the upkeep of the shrine or different functions.
For years, there have been allegations that mujavirs, utilizing the power of their non secular authority, have corralled devotees into making donations.
“We haven’t stopped these individuals from getting into the shrines or performing their non secular duties,” mentioned a waqf board official who didn’t need to be recognized. “We simply banned the apply of forcibly extorting cash from the individuals or of those individuals promoting their spots for a big sum of cash to different individuals.”
He added they didn’t thoughts mujavirs receiving voluntary donations immediately from devotees.
‘Not consulted’
At Srinagar’s Khanqah-e-Moula – the shrine devoted to the 14thcentury Sufi saint, Mir Syyid Ali Hamdani – round 40 mujavirs are up in arms towards the Waqf Board’s order. Earlier than August 16, two to 3 donation bins for mujavirs lined the shrine, alongside about half dozen bins for the Waqf.
“We didn’t come right here yesterday – we now have been right here for the final 200 years,” mentioned 82-year-old Mohammad Yaseen Zahra, a well known mujavirs on the shrine. “This duty [of tending to the shrine] was handed all the way down to us by our ancestors. We symbolize the legacy of Mir Syed Ali Hamdani.”
Based on Zahra, the Waqf Board ought to have taken mujavirs into confidence earlier than it took motion towards donations. “If a mujavir has made a mistake or extorted cash from a devotee, he ought to have been recognized and there ought to have been a case filed towards him,” he protested. “However they cracked down on all of us in a single go. Individuals give to us out of reverence. We don’t power them.”
It’s the rhetoric about mujavirs used to justify the order that has left Zahra aggrieved. “Waqf Board officers used extremely objectionable language towards us,” he mentioned. “We have been labelled thieves, criminals and dacoits. We’re respectable individuals who consider in taking good care of the shrine. What crimes have we dedicated?”
One other mujavir on the shrine, who didn’t need to be named, criticised the Waqf Board for what he noticed as mismanagement of the shrine. “Can they inform us how a lot cash they collected from right here and the way a lot they spent on it? Have they got any account books for that?” demanded the 70-year-old mujavir.
A number of Waqf Board workers are deputed to take care of the shrine. Nonetheless, the 70-year-old claimed, most upkeep work was financed by donations made by devotees to mujavirs.
“The Waqf Board doesn’t even exchange a damaged bulb on the shrine,” he claimed. “It’s the devotees who try this out of their very own pocket.”
Politics of the waqf
Mujavirs and the Waqf Board now commerce allegations of corruption towards one another.
What’s now the Waqf Board was initially arrange in 1940, whereas Jammu and Kashmir was nonetheless a princely state beneath the Dogra kings. The Muslim Auqaf Belief, because it was then known as, was established by Sheikh Abdullah, the Nationwide Convention chief who later turned Jammu and Kashmir’s first prime minister. The belief was meant to assist the poor, handle charitable endowments made to Muslim establishments in addition to earnings generate by the properties it managed.
Adfer Shah, a Kashmiri sociologist who has studied Muslim endowments and the Waqf Board, mentioned the board has had political clout beneath successive governments. “The Auqaf [Waqf] has traditionally been used extra as a political establishment than an Islamic establishment of philanthropy in Kashmir,” he defined.
For many years, the belief remained beneath the direct management of the Nationwide Convention’s prime management, who additionally held political energy in Kashmir. In 2003, the Peoples Democratic Occasion and Congress coalition authorities took management of the property of the Muslim Auqaf Belief, renamed it the Jammu and Kashmir Muslim Waqf Board and handed new legal guidelines about how Waqf properties ought to be managed. This association lasted till 2019, when the board was reconstituted beneath the central legislation.
Whereas the Waqf Board’s “clear up” train is likely to be motivated by the urge to streamline donations on the shrines, the board itself has been beneath a cloud for years. In Kashmir, it’s dogged by allegations of mismanagement and corruption. Whereas it runs on public cash and never financed by the federal government, it’s opaque about how these funds are spent.
Officers of the Waqf Board concede that widespread opinion will not be of their favour. “Political intervention”, they declare, has hamstrung the board for years. “For instance, if the Waqf Board tried to extend a tenant’s lease, the tenant would use strain from some politician to cease the lease going up,” mentioned the Waqf Board official. “And [Waqf] officers wouldn’t be capable of do something. In consequence, a lot of the Waqf property you see is fetching lower than market charges. That should change.”
Given the price of its property, officers declare, the board must be incomes way more than it does in the present day. Its properties embody business buildings, colleges, outlets and land. Its annual turnover is round Rs 60-70 crores, most of which is used to run varied operations, mentioned the Waqf Board official. “We run colleges, orphanages, handle shrines and mosques, and in addition assist the needy on a month-to-month foundation. We additionally take care of sufferers struggling life-threatening illnesses like most cancers,” he defined.
He added that the board was planning to maximise income by climbing rents and leasing out property mendacity vacant. Apart from, the Waqf Board was planning to launch a “white paper” on properties and property to make sure “transparency”, he mentioned.
‘Vote banks’
If the Waqf Board had political clout, the shrines have historically been central to mobilising assist for Kashmiri political events, each pro-India and separatist.
Events such because the Nationwide Convention and the Individuals’s Democratic Occasion competed for the assist of the influential mujavirs in election time. “They have been a form of a vote financial institution for political events, that’s why they have been by no means touched,” the Waqf Board official alleged.
Shah echoed this view. “Each baba, guru, peer sahab or sajjada nasheen has a vote financial institution by way of followers,” he mentioned. Politicians tapped into these assist bases.
After the area misplaced statehood and formal autonomy in 2019, Delhi’s acknowledged purpose was to dismantle the previous political system and vogue a brand new “mainstream” – as events who participate in elections are known as. A method to try this can be to chip away on the base of Kashmiri events just like the Nationwide Convention and Peoples Democratic Occasion. With the BJP’s Andrabi on the helm of the Waqf Board, this impression has been strengthened.
An order issued on September 19 suggests the Waqf Board is anxious to interrupt ties between political events and shrines. The board ordered a ban on the apply of “dastaar-bandi” (turban tying) for “influential individuals, significantly the Political Laders [sic]” at shrines. For years, clerics in addition to mujavirs at shrines have carried out the ritual for dignitaries visiting the shrines. “The leaders proceed to be invited to shrines and their Dastaar Bandi is carried out on the idea of occasion affiliations to advertise political agenda at sacred non secular locations,” the order claimed.
Any more, the order mentioned, “dastaar bandi” can be allowed solely to recognise “non secular achievements”.
A relic of the previous?
The Waqf Board will not be accomplished with the shrines but. “For the primary time, we’re going to write to the federal government to begin a excessive stage probe over crores of rupees that had disappeared with no hint,” the official mentioned.
He claimed the “common public have been appreciative” of the board’s motion towards collections by mujavirs. Actually, there was little criticism from sections of society which don’t consider in worshipping at shrines, a Sufi non secular apply.
Shah felt the establishment of mujavirs was dated and had outlasted its usefulness, on condition that shrines are administered by the Waqf. “It was [a source of] perpetual and generational employment,” he defined.
Others, nevertheless, communicate of how very important mujavirs are to sustaining shrines.“If a peer [spiritual leader, as mujavirs are frequently considered] tells his followers to handle the portray bills of the shrine, they try this fortunately,” defined Ghulam Rasool, a retired authorities worker from Srinagar’s downtown space.
Take Srinagar’s 216-year-old Peer Dastgeer Sahib shrine, which was gutted in a hearth in 2012. Whereas the shrine was rebuilt through the years with the federal government’s assist and public donations, mujavirs on the shrine mentioned they reached out to each huge businessman in Kashmir for assist.
“From the shrine’s flooring to hoover cleaners, all of it has come from the donation of rich individuals in Kashmir,” mentioned Abdul Rehman Reshi, a mujavir on the Dastgeer Sahib shrine. “It was us who reached out and pleaded with them [for help]. How can we be known as looters and thieves?”
He added that on auspicious events, when hundreds flock to the shrine, the sajjada nasheen, or hereditary caretaker, throws his doorways open to feed and shelter individuals.
Even the central Waqf Act recognises the establishment of mujavirs or khadims. Nonetheless, they have to be appointed by the competent authority, on this case, the Jammu and Kashmir Waqf Board. Based on the Waqf Board official, shrines are to be managed immediately by the executives of the board or by an appointed caretaker if the shrine’s annual income is lower than Rs 5 lakh.
Whereas only a few shrines in Kashmir have an annual income of lower than Rs 5 lakh, mujavirs haven’t been appointed to take care of shrines that do match this description.
“They [mujavirs] haven’t any unique proper to income of the shrine,” mentioned the Waqf Board official. “Waqf means it turns into the property of each Muslim. Each Muslims collectively owns this income and has a proper over it.”
Nonetheless, whereas the donation bins for mujavirs are gone, sure conventional exchanges proceed on the shrines. Scroll.in noticed a number of situations the place devotees handed mujavirs cash after being given “tabarruk”, an providing of meals akin to dates, bread or sugar lumps that’s thought-about sacred.
