Year After Umeed Waqf Database Shows 11 Per Cent Applications Rejected A Third From Uttar Pradesh

A YEAR after the Centre launched a portal to create a digital inventory of geo-tagged waqf properties across the country, there’s a question mark on the fate of 88,571 such properties whose details for registration have been rejected after scrutiny. These account for just 11% of the total 7,95,784 waqf properties sought to be registered.

Data available on the UMEED portal — the Unified Waqf Management, Empowerment, Efficiency and Development platform — show that a total of 5,87,804 properties or 74% of the total were approved for inclusion. The registration process is yet to be completed.

Uttar Pradesh with 31,783 rejections accounts for almost 36% of the waqf properties nationwide that failed to find space on the UMEED portal. West Bengal with rejection of 14,134 waqf property applications accounts for 16% of the total rejections, and Rajasthan with 12,080 accounts for over 13% of total rejections. Following the non-inclusion of 88,571 properties, officials of waqf boards in several states told The Indian Express that they have “no idea” what will happen to the properties rejected by the portal.

States that witnessed the maximum rejection of their Waqf property applications included Rajasthan (37%), Tamil Nadu (26%), Uttar Pradesh (22.23%). In absolute terms, a total of 7,95,784 waqf properties were sought to be included on the portal — 160,857 properties from Uttar Pradesh alone (20.1%) and another 1,34,545 (16.9%) from West Bengal. In Uttar Pradesh, which has two separate waqf boards for Shia and Sunni communities, 29,724 of the 1.52 lakh Sunni waqf property applications were rejected. Of the 8,171 Shia waqf property applications, 2,059 were rejected. In neighbouring Uttarakhand, 455 of the 2,468 property applications were rejected.

The Centre launched the UMEED portal on June 6, 2025, to create a digital inventory after geo-tagging all waqf properties. Details of all registered waqf properties across India were to be mandatorily uploaded within six months. On December 5 last year, when the six-month deadline for inclusion in the portal ran out, Union Minority Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said that there would be no penalty for those who had failed to register properties on the portal, and that they could approach the waqf tribunals in the states for an extension. Subsequently, state waqf tribunals granted extensions to upload the details. The extended deadline has already passed in some states, while it will run out in the coming days in other states.

The process for getting a waqf property registered on the portal has three layers – initiation by maker (mutawalli or caretaker of a waqf property), a check by the “checker” (a designated district-level official or state waqf board official), and approval by the “approver” (senior waqf board officials in the state).

In Uttar Pradesh, which has two separate waqf boards for Shia and Sunni communities, the Sunni Waqf Board saw 29,724 out of 1.52 lakh applications for properties being rejected. The Shia Waqf Board saw rejection of 2,059 properties out of 8,171 applications. Uttar Pradesh Shia Waqf Board chairman Ali Zaidi said: “As per the Waqf Act, there was no provision regarding the roadmap on what will happen to properties rejected (for inclusion) on the portal. We have received no information from the government on this.”

A mutawalli in Delhi, who manages a property which has been rejected, said: “The property has not been registered, and no explanation has been provided. Even the status of registration remains unknown to us. The website does not display whether the application is under process, has been registered, or has been rejected.” He said they were planning to move court because “our properties were already registered as waqf properties”.

CEOs of some waqf boards said they have written to the Centre, seeking more time to complete the process on the portal. “We wrote to the Ministry in June seeking an extension, but have received no reply,” one of the CEOs said.

Officials in the Ministry of Minority Affairs attribute the range in rejection percentage to several reasons — quality of land records, awareness and difference in volume of waqf properties in different states. “The first step has to be taken by mutawallis. Some states have better literacy rates, so their mutawallis are more aware. They started the process on time and hence, the states have done better. Southern states have better legacy data for land records, so they have done well,” a senior officer in the Ministry said.

Asad Rehman is with the national bureau of The Indian Express and covers politics and policy focusing on religious minorities in India. A journalist for over eight years, Rehman moved to this role after covering Uttar Pradesh for five years for The Indian Express. During his time in Uttar Pradesh, he covered politics, crime, health, and human rights among other issues. He did extensive ground reports and covered the protests against the new citizenship law during which many were killed in the state. During the Covid pandemic, he did extensive ground reporting on the migration of workers from the metropolitan cities to villages in Uttar Pradesh. He has also covered some landmark litigations, including the Babri Masjid-Ram temple case and the ongoing Gyanvapi-Kashi Vishwanath temple dispute. Prior to that, he worked on The Indian Express national desk for three years where he was a copy editor. Rehman studied at La Martiniere, Lucknow and then went on to do a bachelor's degree in History from Ramjas College, Delhi University. He also has a Masters degree from the AJK Mass Communication Research Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia. ... Read More