Amid opposition demand, Waqf JPC to meet on Friday and Monday

NEW DELHI: The JPC on Waqf Amendment Bill has modified the earlier announced schedule, and will now meet on Friday to hear Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and lawyers, and then on Monday to consider the bill clause by clause. The original schedule was to have back-to-back meetings on Friday and Saturday, but the opposition had demanded that the sessions be postponed by a week to Jan 30 and 31. The opposition MPs will be attending the meetings.
Seeking postponement, the opposition had argued that MPs had not got the required time to collect evidence and peruse material to finalise their arguments for a clause-by-clause discussion and for moving the amendments, and scheduling meetings just three days after the end of field tours will "defeat" the "purpose of the constitution of the JPC itself".
After JPC had announced its earlier schedule, opposition MPs, represented by DMK's A Raja, shot off a protest letter to panel chairman Jagdambika Pal raising the issue.