Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Aug 23: It is indeed a great relief to members of Scheduled Caste (SC) community that after reorganization of J&K State they have no need to obtain separate caste certificates for availing reservation benefits under central and UT Government.
This was stated by Balbir Ram Rattan, J&K BJP Spokesperson in a handout.
He claimed that prior to abrogation of Article-370, lakhs of SCs in J&K had to produce one caste certificate for jobs in J&K Government or to seek benefits of welfare schemes and a different certificate for central Government jobs.
“It was totally unjustified but such a practice remained there for decades together after independence,” he maintained adding that although the successive Governments in J&K had ministers belonging to SC community but none of them dared to raise the issue for remaining in good books of their Kashmiri masters as the erstwhile J&K State always had Chief Ministers and heads of political parties like Congress, NC and PDP from Valley.
“In BJP, party leaders continuously raised burning issues and problems of SCs and when it was in power as coalition partner, it succeeded in ending the practice of bringing new SROs after every 12-15 years with regard to issuance of new caste certificates on nullifying of the previous ones,” he further claimed.
Balbir said that BJP had been agitating for grant of citizenship rights to West Pakistan Refugees for decades after independence and more than 70 per cent among them belonged to the SC community which speaks of the concern of BJP for this community.
Follow our WhatsApp channel