The Opposition parties welcomed the Supreme Court’s interim order on the challenge to the Waqf Amendment Act and pledged to continue the fight against the changes, which they fear would dilute the role of Muslims in managing their community’s charities.

Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi told reporters: “The Waqf Amendment Act is not an exercise in efficiency as it pretends to be. It is an exercise in erasure…. This is not about improving institutions but about infiltrating, controlling and closing them.

“It’s not about minorities called Muslims — it’s about a message that minority institutions are fair game for state takeover…. If we do not speak today, tomorrow we
may lose our right to speak and this fight is not only against a law but also against a thought.”

Welcoming the order, CPM state secretary M.V. Govindan said the apex court’s intervention was a relief for secular groups in the country. He said the order was an effective defence against the Centre’s “arbitrary, anti-secular” decision to amend the waqf act. Speaking to reporters in Thiruvananthapuram, he said that the final decision from the top court would be in their favour.

In Calcutta, chief minister Mamata Banerjee parried questions on the judgment.

Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi, who was in court as one of the petitioners, said: “During the deliberations of the joint parliamentary committee, I gave a report opposing all amendments proposed by the government, and during the debate on the bill, I called the bill unconstitutional. Our legal battle against this act will continue.”

AAP MLA and former Delhi waqf head Amanatullah Khan told reporters outside the court: “We are satisfied with the decision as the central government said in the court that properties under waqf-by-user would continue to be there with waqf, and there would be no interference in selecting the members of the waqf board.”

Addressing reporters at a party event in Bhubaneswar, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav said: “The BJP knows how to snatch from people. Now they have come up with this waqf bill, they want to snatch land, they don’t want to give anything.”