Nishikant Khajuria
JAMMU, Feb 13: The bill seeking much talked about reservation for Pahari-speaking people in Jammu and Kashmir has been virtually put into cold storage as the State Governor N N Vohra has returned it to the Legislature for reconsidering the same in the light of its legal and other deficiencies.
Conveying his dissent on the bill, the Governor is learnt to have questioned whether according reservation on the basis of language was constitutional or not,” authoritative sources informed the Excelsior.
“In view of the provisions of Article 16 of the Constitution of India, as applicable to the State of Jammu and Kashmir, the reservation prescribed in the Bill is constitutionally questionable as it seeks to provide reservation to persons living anywhere in the State on the sole ground of their speaking a particularly language without any criteria of backwardness being assessed and satisfied,” the Governor has observed in his dissent note, attached with the Bill, which was returned to the Legislative Assembly a few days ago.
In his four point observations, the Governor has also said that the criteria to be adopted and the authority competent to identify such areas where Pahari speaking people should be residing in order to become entitled to the proposed reservation, have not been specified. He also mentioned about the Supreme Court ceiling limit of 50 percent and its observations on Constitutional requirements before making provisions for reservations.
“In view of above mentioned deficiencies, I am under proviso to Section 78 of the Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir, returning this Bill to the Legislature with the request that the House reconsider it,” the Governor said in his note.
With these observations of the Governor, the Bill proposing reservation to Pahari speaking people has been returned to the Legislative Assembly, which is learnt to have forwarded the same to Law Department and then the Department of Social Welfare for its reconsideration, sources said.
It may be recalled that the previous Omar Abdullah-led National Conference-Congress coalition Government had passed the bill proposing five percent reservation to Pahari-speaking people by amending the J&K reservation rules. The Bill along with several other legislations, was passed in last session of the State Legislature, held in August 2014, and then sent to the Governor for his concurrence in first week of the October.
Even as the Governor House approved all the legislations, the bill for reservation to Pahari speaking people was put on hold for more than three months following questions over its legal validity.
According to the sources, the Raj Bhawan was treading cautiously on the issue as different quarters, particularly some politico-social groups of Gujjar community were questioning legality of the Bill.
Following the Governor’s dissent observations and his decision of returning the Bill back to the Assembly, the issue of much talked about reservation to Pahari speaking people in Jammu and Kashmir is back to square one as the new State Government, which is yet to be formed, will have to re-initiate the move from beginning.
Since the possible alliance partners PDP and BJP have eight Gujjar MLAs, the Bill for reservation to Pahari speaking people is likely to remain in cold storage for time being notwithstanding the soft corner of both the parties towards the issue.
Meanwhile, the J&K Pahari Cultural and Welfare Forum, which has been spearheading the struggle for reservation to the Pahari speaking people, has convened an emergency meeting of the Pahari legislators and ex-legislators of the community to chalk out further course of action on the issue. “We will continue our struggle to the logical conclusion as our demand is most genuine and all political parties have repeatedly assured us their support for the same,” said Mushtaq Bukhari, chairman of the Forum.
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