The Jammu and Kashmir Waqf Board withdrew its proposal to standardise Friday sermon content across all mosques in the region on 16 October, following objections from political parties, religious organisations, and civil society groups.

Waqf Board chairperson Darakshan Andrabi, who represents the Bharatiya Janata Party, stated that no formal directive on standardised Friday sermons had been issued, and that decisions about sermon themes would rest with preachers rather than politicians. The withdrawal came after leaders of the ruling National Conference, the People's Democratic Party, and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq — Kashmir's chief cleric — raised objections to the plan.

Andrabi noted that religious figures and scholars connected to the Waqf Board had consulted on the matter, with the outcome being that they retained the freedom to operate without external oversight. Video recorded at a meeting the Waqf Board had convened with religious scholars subsequently became publicly accessible.

Discussions recorded within the video centred on establishing a body — led by preachers and religious scholars — with responsibility for selecting the themes to be covered in standardised Friday sermons. A gathering of religious leaders who deliver Friday addresses, drawn from across Jammu and Kashmir and encompassing imams, khateebs, and maulvis, had put forward the proposal that environmental and social topics be incorporated into their weekly sermons on a regular basis, a recommendation that preceded the policy reversal.

Since August 2019, oversight of shrines and other Waqf-held properties across the territory has rested with the Waqf Board, which holds responsibility for their day-to-day administration. Religious figures with ties to the ruling establishment voiced support for the Waqf Board, maintaining that no official plan to standardise mosque sermons had been put forward.

Maulana A. Rashid Dawoodi, representing south Kashmir among those present, told reporters on 16 October that he had attended the gathering convened by the Waqf Board. He stated that the purpose of the gathering was to address various social concerns, and he rejected as unfounded the notion that the Waqf Board would exercise control over the content of Friday sermons, characterising that account as not accurately reflecting what took place.

Dawoodi relayed Andrabi's position that religious scholars and preachers carry a heightened duty to address social and environmental concerns, given the influence they hold over communities and their capacity to shape public attitudes. He also described Andrabi's motivations as genuine.

Maulana Riyaz-ul-Haq, who leads prayers at Srinagar's Hazratbal shrine and has ties to the dispensation, described the gathering as friendly in tone and oriented toward matters of community concern, adding that neither the government nor the Waqf Board had placed any pressure on those who deliver sermons and religious addresses. He noted that those gathered had directed their attention toward tackling drug misuse and other harmful social behaviours within their communities. In her capacity leading the Waqf Board, Andrabi holds the authority to summon board members for a meeting.

A position paper issued by the Muttahida Majlis-e-Ulema — the body of Islamic scholars headed by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq — set out the organisation's opposition to any government-directed regulation of Friday sermon content. The MMU holds a recognised place among Jammu and Kashmir's established bodies operating at the intersection of social and religious affairs.

Mirwaiz told a television channel that no official body holds authority over the content of Friday prayer addresses, and that neither the state nor its institutions are positioned to oversee religious discourse or prescribe the text of sermons delivered at Friday congregations. He conveyed that any such actions would amount to interference in religious affairs and matters of faith, and that the MMU had taken a firm position against entertaining proposals of that nature.

Mirwaiz further conveyed that scholars versed in jurisprudence from within the faith tradition are free to gather on a voluntary basis and work through the religious, social, and environmental concerns facing people in Kashmir. He argued that any official body prescribing sermon content to imams would run counter to both the law and the protected right to worship freely. He also conveyed that the Waqf Board's responsibilities ought to remain confined to administering, overseeing, maintaining, and safeguarding the properties placed in its care, and that any encroachment upon the community's religious beliefs or its freedom of worship would be treated as unacceptable.

On 16 October, the MMU launched a region-wide sermon programme spanning the Kashmir Valley, Chenab Valley, Kargil, and Leh, marking the organisation's first coordinated effort across all four areas simultaneously. Clergy were asked by the MMU to centre their addresses on faith, which had been set as the unifying topic for the occasion.

According to Mirwaiz, the programme stems from resolutions adopted by MMU leadership when its Ulema Conference convened on 15 September. Religious leaders drawn from a range of doctrinal traditions had gathered at the conference and reached a joint decision to bring shared concerns before their congregations during Friday prayers.

Mirwaiz opened the initiative by taking to the pulpit at the Sufi shrine of Chrar-e-Sharief in central Kashmir — a site honouring Sheikh Noor-ud-Din, the revered figure known as Nund Reshi. The MMU's statement placed the sermon's focus on themes of faith and steadfastness.

Mirwaiz told those gathered that faith goes beyond words alone, taking shape instead through a person's character, behaviour, and treatment of others. A second preacher, Hassan Firdousi, addressing worshippers at a mosque in Lawaypora, Srinagar, questioned the Waqf Board's authority to dictate the topics that Islamic scholars and sermon-givers address on Fridays, stating that any such proposal had been flatly rejected by those he represented.

Jammu and Kashmir's Chief Minister, Omar Abdullah, pushed back against what he described as Waqf Board overreach into religious matters. In a post on X, he described the move as an attempt by the BJP to intervene in Muslim religious matters, characterising it as unacceptable and stating it would face firm opposition.

A political rival called on Andrabi to withdraw what that opponent characterised as a poorly considered directive. Mehbooba Mufti — PDP president and former Chief Minister — also objected to any Waqf Board effort to bring uniformity to sermon content at mosques and shrines across the region. In a video statement, she explained that Friday sermons at her institution are guided primarily by the concerns and circumstances of a given community, while also taking in broader social questions.

Mufti's position was that imposing a uniform template on such sermons would disregard the distinct circumstances facing different communities, as well as the role religious scholars play in offering guidance. She linked this concern to the BJP's push for a Uniform Civil Code, while also contending that the nation draws its strength from the coexistence of many traditions and that each group retains the right to observe its own customs and hold to its own beliefs. Mufti added that imposing a uniform framework on all parties ought to be avoided.