The Union Government has issued a notice to the Kerala Waqf Board for registering the Munambam lands with the Umeed Portal using special powers. The notice, dated June 13, asks the Waqf Board to submit an explanation within five weeks. The Kerala Waqf Board registered the 404-acre Munambam land last month, wielding special powers.
BJP Keralam President Rajeev Chandrasekhar and Nemom MLA had drawn the attention of the Union Government and Union Minority Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju to this development. According to the Waqf Board rules, the authority to register Waqf land with the Umeed Portal vests with the ‘Mutawalli’. However, in this case, the Umeed Portal registration was carried out without complying with the existing laws, rules and regulations.
Chandrasekhar stated that following his intervention and representations to Union Minority Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju, the Union Government had sought an explanation from the Kerala Waqf Board regarding its actions in the Munambam land dispute.
Munambam will not become another Waqf land grab.
Thank you, PM @narendramodi ji and Union Minister @KirenRijiju ji, for acting swiftly on my request.
The Kerala Waqf Board's unilateral registration of 404 acres in Munambam on the UMEED portal is entirely illegal, since the law… pic.twitter.com/qGMxBFN0DU
— Rajeev Chandrasekhar 🇮🇳 (@RajeevRC_X) June 15, 2026
He further asserted that no authority should assume that a “weak Congress-led government in Keralam” provides a licence to violate the rule of law or undermine the rights of ordinary citizens.
Earlier, Chandrasekhar had also urged the Centre to exercise its supervisory powers to remove what he described as illegally uploaded entries relating to the disputed 404-acre Munambam land from the UMEED Porta
However, Waqf Board Chairman K.S. Hamsa made it clear that they would respond to the Union Government’s communication only after the Board meeting on June 16. Hamsa added that the Board has sought legal advice in this regard.
The latest development indicates that the Union Government is not going to remain passive if the Waqf Board proceeds with actions that are alleged to be contrary to the rule of law. The Munambam issue affects more than 600 to 800 families, most of whom are Latin Christians.
While the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) and the CPM-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) have faced criticism from sections of residents over the handling of the issue, the BJP has consistently expressed support for the affected families.
Munambam, a coastal settlement on Vypeen Island in Ernakulam district, has been at the centre of a long-running land dispute involving approximately 404 acres claimed by the Kerala Waqf Board. The controversy traces its origins to land transactions linked to Farook College in the 1950s and has since witnessed decades of legal battles and competing ownership claims. More than 600 families, largely from the Latin Christian fishing community, maintain that they legally purchased and occupied the land over generations. The dispute intensified after the Kerala Waqf Board registered the land in its records and subsequently uploaded it to the Centre’s Umeed Portal, triggering fresh legal, political and public protests across the state.
