Mr. R.P. Nagrath, J.: - The petitioners have invoked the revisional jurisdiction of this Court under Article 227 of the Constitution of India seeking to challenge the order dated 08.04.2011 passed by the Waqf Tribunal, directing the return of plaint to be presented before the court of competent jurisdiction.

2. The question arising in the instant revision is “whether the suit instituted by plaintiff-petitioners is triable exclusively by Waqf Tribunal, Rup Nagar or by an ordinary civil court?”

3. The suit land comprising of two khasra numbers total measuring 9 kanals 11 marlas is stated to be a Muslim graveyard and, therefore, a ‘Waqf property’. Muslim residents of village Kumbra, where the land is situated, have formed a Muslim Welfare Committee-petitioner no. 1, registered under the Societies Registration Act, 1860. The suit has been filed through petitioners no. 2 and 3.

4. It was stated that the land is ‘Muslim graveyard’ and Muslims of village Kumbra and adjoining villages have been using this land as a graveyard for burial of Muslim dead bodies since times immemorial. It was further stated that Muslims of the area are facing great difficulty for the past many years as certain persons, namely; respondents no. 3 to 8 who are having their houses around or near the disputed site, raise protests and object to the bringing of dead bodies, forcing the families to wait for burial for 2 to 3 days. It is only with the intervention of police they are able to bury the dead bodies. The petitioners have undertaken that they would raise fencing around the graveyard at their own expenditure, without claiming any ownership right, because Waqf Board is not maintaining and protecting the property in question.

5. Learned counsel for respondent-defendants no. 1 and 2 also submitted that the land in question is meant for Muslim graveyard but contended that the management, control and administration of the land vests in the Waqf Board. The learned counsel, however, supported the contention of the petitioners that the Tribunal constituted under the Waqf Act, would have the exclusive jurisdiction to entertain and try the dispute. Respondents no. 4 and 6 to 9 have not disputed that the suit land was a Muslim graveyard. It was pleaded by them in the written statement that the matter was settled with the intervention of Deputy Commissioner in the presence of Senior Superintendent of Police, Mohali and it was decided that in future dead bodies would be buried at some other place and not in the present graveyard because the residential colony has been developed around the graveyard. The residents have also built up three storeyed houses in Phase-IX, Mohali. The children belonging to these families get scared of the scene when the dead bodies are brought and buried in their presence. Greater Mohali Area Development Authority (GMADA) is stated to have already provided five acres of land in village Balongi for burial of dead bodies of Muslims and Christians as an alternative site. GMADA has also been asked to maintain the present graveyard as a park by planting flowers etc. on it.

6. I have heard learned counsel for the parties, carefully perused the impugned order, the paper-book and also the record.

7. The relevant provisions of the waqf Act, 1995 (for short ‘the Act’) are Sections 6, 7 and 85 of the Act. These provisions as amended by the Waqf (Amendment) Act, 2013, read as under:-

“6. Disputes regarding waqfs.-

(1) If any question arises whether a particular property specified as waqf property in the list of waqfs is ‘waqf property’ or not or whether a waqf specified in such list is a Shia waqf or Sunni waqf, the Board or the mutawalli of the waqf or any person aggrieved may institute a suit in a Tribunal for the decision of the question and the decision of the Tribunal in respect of such matter shall be final:

Provided that no suit shall be instituted before the Tribunal in respect of such properties notified in a second or subsequent surve