Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, July 9: Sub Major (retd) Madan Lal Dabgotra, founder and chairman of All Jammu and Kashmir OBC Manch has urged upon to the Union Government that there should be one reservation policy in the country for all caste based reserve categories carved out of the Socially and Educationally Backward Classes (SEBC).
In a statement issued here, today he said as per Article 15 and 16 of the Constitution, all Reserve Categories are the Backward Classes categories. However, there is great discrimination in the present reservation policy, since separate eligibility criteria and percentage of reservation has been laid down for SC/ST and OBC categories, which has defeated the spirit of Article 14, 15 and 16 of the Constitution of India.
As per Article 14 of the Constitution, every section of the Society should be provided equal opportunities in every field. However, as per present reservation policy, the OBC category has been denied political reservation thus denying the proper representation to OBC category in the State Assemblies and the Parliament. Further, as per Article 243 D (1) and 243T (1) of the Constitution, it is mandatory for the States/UTs to provide reservation to SC and ST categories in the Panchayats and Local Body Elections, while in case of OBC Category, it is at the discretion of the State/UT Government to provide the reservation in Panchayats and Municipalities in terms of Article 243 D (6) and 243T (6). Hence present reservation policy is controversial in terms of Article 14 of the Constitution, as sole purpose of provisions of Article 14 has been defeated and great discrimination has been meted out to the OBC category in reservation provisions.
He said, as per the present reservation policy, SC and ST category are entitled 100% reservation equal to their population, since SC category provided 15% reservation and ST as 7.5% i.e. as per population ratio of these categories. Even though, whole quota as entitled i.e. equal to the population ratio of the respective category is reserved for them, yet people of these categories are also entitled to avail additional quota benefit out of general category share, apart from reservation quota of the category which is great injustice and discrimination with general category people.
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