MQM's Land Reforms Bill un-Islamic: JUP

Islam has not fixed any limit for holding land as personal property argues the Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan.

HYDERABAD: The Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan (JUP) on Wednesday rejected the Land Reforms Bill presented by the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), terming it un-Islamic.

In a statement, JUP Chief Dr Sahibzada Abul Khair Muhammad Zubair said, “Islam has not fixed any limit for holding land as personal property nor does it call for seizing land held by any person.”

The JUP chief said the Land Reforms Bill of the MQM, which suggests landholding limit of 36 acres and 54 acres, was against the Shariah.“The verdicts of Pakistan’s Shariah Court on this issue too are very clear,” he said.

Zubair urged the members of national assembly and the senate not to pass the bill, which according to him, was an attempt to introduce an un-Islamic system in the name of abolishing the feudal system.

“The JUP would not allow to impose any system in the country, which is against the basic principles of Islam,” he vowed.

A day earlier the MQM had submitted a land reforms bill in the National Assembly secretariat proposing limits on land holdings.

The bill proposes that each family should be allowed to own a maximum of 30 acres irrigated or 54 acres arid (barani) land. The bill does not apply to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

The MQM said its draft legislation, titled “The Redistributive Land Reforms Bill, 2010,” is aimed at the eradication of hereditary ownership of agricultural land and its redistribution among tillers.

The proposed bill says that land is a free bounty of nature and that the state has been recognised as its owner, both by the Muslim and Hindu jurists.