Waqf Council to fund digitisation of state waqf boards

New Delhi, Feb 15 : The Central Waqf Council will provide funds to the state waqf boards for completion of their digitisation in the stipulated timeframe, it was announced on Thursday.

The decision was taken at the 78th meeting of the Central Waqf Council chaired by Union Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi which reviewed the functioning of state waqf boards. 

The digitisation of waqf records is expected to bring transparency in the functioning of state waqf boards which usually function in an opaque manner and whose functionaries face corruption charges. 

Besides, the Waqf Council will be appointing two legal support officers, two zonal waqf officers and two surveyors in every state waqf board for "preservation, maintenance, development of waqf properties and related legal matters", Naqvi said after the meeting. 

"The Central Waqf Council will also help those institutes which are being established and those who are running on waqf properties and are engaged in educational activities especially educational empowerment of girls," he said.

He said that conferences of waqf mutawallis (caretakers/incharge) will be organised across the country regarding preservation and development of waqf properties under the Waqf Act. 

The first such ‘Waqf Mutawallis conference' will be held in New Delhi on March 8 in which mutawallis and representatives from state waqf boards from all the north Indian states would participate, the Minister said.