New Delhi, April 7: The pleas in the Supreme Court challenging the recent amendments introduced to the Waqf Act were mentioned on Monday before Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sanjiv Khanna for urgent listing.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal urged CJI Khanna to give an urgent hearing on the petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2025.

In response, the CJI, who is the master of the roster, asked the senior counsel if he had moved an email containing the mentioning letter. When informed that the same had already been done, CJI Khanna said, “I will get the letter and do the needful this afternoon.”

Several petitions have been filed before the apex court challenging the amendments immediately after the Parliament passed the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2025, on Friday.

After the legislation was passed in both Houses of Parliament, the Indian National Congress announced it would challenge the Waqf (Amendment) Bill before the Supreme Court. Congress claimed that it was an attack on the basic structure of the Constitution and was aimed at “polarising” and “dividing” the country on the basis of religion.

In his petition, Congress MP and party whip in Lok Sabha Mohammad Jawed contended that the amendments violated Articles 14 (right to equality), 25 (freedom to practice and propagate religion), 26 (freedom of religious denominations to manage their religious affairs), 29 (minority rights), and 300A (right to property) of the Constitution.

Similarly, All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Akbaruddin Owaisi has moved the top court, saying that the impugned amendments are “ex facie violative of Articles 14, 15, 21, 25, 26, 29, 30, 300A of the Constitution of India and manifestly arbitrary”.

The concept of ‘Waqf’, rooted in Islamic laws and traditions, refers to an endowment made by a Muslim for charitable or religious purposes, such as mosques, schools, hospitals, or other public institutions. The government said that crores of poor Muslims will benefit from this legislation, and in no way does it harm any single Muslim.

Minority Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju has said the legislation did not interfere with the Waqf properties, adding that the Modi government works with the vision of ‘Sabka Saath and Sabka Vikas’.

Kolkata, April 7: As West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee prepares to meet a group of job losers in state-run schools on Monday, following the Supreme Court’s order that annulled 25,753 teaching and non-teaching jobs last week, questions are arising about whether this is a political gimmick or a genuine effort to solve the problem.

The Chief Minister, as promised, will be present at the meeting to listen to these job losers about their contentions and suggest ways to resolve the looming crisis.

The first confusion is whether the “tainted” candidates, who reportedly got jobs after paying money, will also be present at the meeting along with the “genuine” ones who lost jobs because of the failure to segregate “tainted” from “genuine candidates.

Several reportedly “genuine” candidates, who have received entry passes for the proposed meeting at Netaji Indoor Stadium in central Kolkata, said they had received the passes because they were the “genuine” ones and, hence, will not allow “ineligible” ones without entry passes to be present at the meeting.

However, another section, who have not received entry passes, claimed that since the entire panel of 25,753 jobs was cancelled because of the segregation failure, how can it be decided now — who is “genuine” and who is not?

The second complication or confusion over the meeting is where the entry passes for the said meeting were issued. While those who have received such entry passes have claimed that those were issued from the state secretariat of Nabanna, those who have not received such entry passes have claimed that they are not aware of who the actual organiser of the scheduled meeting was and hence who issued such passes.

However, officially, the state government has maintained that the convener of the meeting is an association of jobless people who are now deprived of jobs because of the apex court order, and the Chief Minister is going there to listen to them on humanitarian grounds.

Already, candidates — those having entry passes and those who do not have the passes — have assembled in front of the Netaji Indoor Stadium, and there have been several rounds of altercations between the two groups. A huge police contingent is already present at the spot, trying to keep the two groups at a distance.

The third complication is that an eminent painter and a prominent writer from West Bengal are also scheduled to speak at the proposed meeting. Political observers feel that the invitation to the painter and the writer is redundant since the entire matter of finding a solution is purely “legal” and “administrative.”

Mumbai, April 7: The Indian stock markets crashed on Monday morning over fears of US reciprocal tariffs set to come into force from April 9. The Nifty 50 and Sensex were trading 3.85 per cent and 4.16 per cent down, respectively, in early trade.

All the sectoral indices were trading in the red with IT and metal down 7 per cent each. BSE Midcap and smallcap indices were down 6 per cent each in early trade..

Tata Steel, JSW Steel, Tata Motors and ONGC were among major losers on the Nifty.

However, there was some recovery seen after the mayhem at the opening bell as buying returned.

According to experts, equity markets were expected to open on a bearish note today, as suggested by the GIFT Nifty, which hovered around 22,090 in early trades — reflecting a significant decline of 867 points.

“This indicates a cautious sentiment among investors, largely driven by weak global cues and the lack of strong domestic triggers. In the absence of local catalysts, market participants are likely to take cues from global market trends, crude oil prices, and institutional flows for further direction,” said experts.

On the technical front, the Nifty 50 has formed a bearish candle on the daily chart, signaling selling pressure at key resistance levels.

“Immediate support is seen at 22,400 and 22,000 for intraday trading, as the index has historically shown stability around these zones. These levels could potentially act as reversal points, offering buying opportunities if supported by favourable price action. On the upside, 23,000 acts as the immediate resistance level. A sustained move above this mark could pave the way for further upside toward 23,100 and 23,400,” experts noted.

Similarly, the Bank Nifty also displayed a bearish candle on the daily chart, indicating heightened selling interest.

In terms of institutional activity, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) remained net sellers for the fifth consecutive session on April 4, offloading equities worth Rs 3,483 crore.

Meanwhile, domestic institutional investors (DIIs), who had been net buyers over the past five sessions, turned sellers and offloaded equities worth Rs 1,720 crore on the same day.