New Delhi, April 8 -- The Waqf Act of 2025 arrives at a time when India, poised to become the world's third-largest economy, still grapples with deep-rooted socio-economic inequalities. While GDP growth has transformed urban skylines and lifted millions out of poverty, the benefits of this progress have not reached all communities equally.

The forthcoming reform of the Waqf system-a vast network of Muslim charitable endowments-could, if implemented thoughtfully, become a tool to address one of the country's most persistent development challenges: the economic marginalization of large segments of India's Muslim population.

Results from the PRICE ICE 360deg Survey (2021), one of India's most comprehensive household-level income surveys, u...