by admin | May 25, 2021 | News, Politics
Hyderabad : Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday said attempts to provide reservation to minorities are betrayal with the nation and an insult to the framers of the Indian Constitution.
Addressing an election rally of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), he called for defeating any such move to protect the country’s unity.
Hitting out at the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) government for its move to increase reservation for minorities to 12 per cent, Modi said he was surprised how the power-hungry were pushing for religion-based quota for the sake of their family and to save their seats of power.
Stating that the issue of religion-based reservation was discussed in the Constituent Assembly, the Prime Minister said the great personalities framing the Constitution decided against it in the interest of the country’s unity.
Modi wondered from where the reservation for minorities would come when the Supreme Court had already fixed the upper limit of total reservation at 50 per cent.
“They will take away the rights of Dalits, STs and OBCs from backdoor. Will you allow this crime?” he asked the participants in the rally held at L.B. Stadium.
Telangana Assembly had last year passed a resolution to increase reservation for minorities in jobs and education from current 4 per cent to 12 per cent and the same was sent to the Centre. TRS had blamed Modi for the delay in implementing its poll promise made in 2014.
Modi also came down heavily on TRS, saying it destroyed Telangana the way Congress destroyed the nation.
Countering Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s allegation that TRS is ‘B’ team of BJP, Modi said TRS and the Congress had common nature, character, thinking and policies.
The Prime Minister recalled that during the Karnataka Assembly elections, Rahul Gandhi used to dub Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) as the ‘B’ team of BJP, but after the elections formed the government with the same party to keep the BJP out of power.
Branding the TRS and the Congress as the two sides of the same coin, he alleged that they have already started planning backdoor entry to prevent BJP from coming to power in Telangana.
Modi said both TRS president and Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrashekhar Rao and Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu had their apprenticeship in the Congress and this made them natural friends.
He described dynasty politics as a threat to the democracy. He pointed out that barring the BJP, all major parties in fray in the Telangana elections were parties with dynasty politics and family rule.
He said the Congress, TRS, Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM) all were family-ruled parties. “All these parties are becoming threat to democracy,” he remarked.
Modi said Telangana had wasted its five years of welfare due to the arrogance of one family. He alleged that the KCR family exploited emotions of Telangana movement for itself. Stating that Telangana had huge potential, he said the state could not progress because of the kind of rulers it got.
“Why people of Telangana demanded a separate state? Why they suffered so long for separate Telangana. Why so many youth sacrificed their lives? They did it for a bright future of Telangana. One family was not to be given the right to loot Telangana.”
Referring to the TDP’s alliance with the Congress, Modi recalled that N.T. Rama Rao had formed the TDP for the self-respect of Telugu people after former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi had insulted them.
He alleged that TDP president N. Chandrababu Naidu for the sake of power and vested interests put the entire party into the lap of Rahul Gandhi.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Finance, News, Politics
New Delhi : Twentyfour years after its introduction in the government, the Union Cabinet on Wednesday decided to extend the concept of creamy layer in OBC reservations to Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) and financial institutions.
The Cabinet, which had last week raised the annual income ceiling of Rs 6 lakh to Rs 8 lakh for eligibility for reservations for Other Backward Classes, decided on extending the concept at its meeting on Wednesday, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley told the media.
He said even though the government had decided the criteria for deciding the creamy layer on the basis of income and status in 1993, the concept of creamy layer itself was not implemented in PSUs and financial institutions like banks and insurance companies.
“Now, on the advice of the Group of Ministers, the cabinet has given its approval” to implement it, Jaitley said.
“Now the same limit of Rs 8 lakhs, which is applicable on central government, will also be applicable on PSUs and financial institutions,” he said.
“With regards to status, candidates whose parents hold constitutional posts or group A and B posts are excluded,” Jaitley said.
The minister said that with these decisions, the benefits will spread more widely in the OBC community.
“This will ensure that the children of those serving in lower categories in PSUs and other institutions can get the benefit of OBC reservations, on par with children of people serving in lower categories in government,” an official statement said.
“This will also prevent children of those in senior positions in such institutions — who, owing to absence of equivalence of posts, may have been treated as non-creamy layer — from cornering government posts reserved for OBCs and denying the genuine non-creamy layer candidates a level playing field,” it added.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Employment, Government Jobs, News, Politics
New Delhi : The creamy layer ceiling for Other Backward Classes candidates for securing government jobs was on Wednesday raised to Rs 8 lakh as the union cabinet cleared a proposal for a commission to work out sub-categorisation within OBCs for a “more equitable distribution of reservation benefits”.
Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said after a cabinet meeting here that OBC families earning up to Rs 8 lakh per annum will not be considered in the creamy layer. Earlier, this ceiling was Rs 6 lakh per annum.
“The cabinet was apprised that the creamy layer criterion limit has been raised to Rs 8 lakh annually for the central government,” he said.
Asked if the raised limit will also be applicable to public sector undertakings, Jaitley said the issue was under “active consideration of the government”.
Jaitley said the cabinet approved a proposal for setting up of a commission under article 340 of the Constitution to examine the issue of sub-categorisation of the OBCs.
He said the commission will examine the extent of inequitable distribution of benefits of reservation among the castes or communities included in the broad category of OBCs, with reference to the OBCs included in the Central list.
It will work out the mechanism and parameters for sub-categorisation within such OBCs, identify the respective castes or communities or sub-castes in the central list of OBCs and classify them into their respective sub-categories.
“With this, those in the broad category of OBCs who were till now devoid of benefits of reservation, will get the benefits. There will be more equitable distribution,” he said.
The commission will submit its report within 12 weeks from the date of appointment of the Chairperson.
Jaitley said the National Commission for Backward Classes had given its recommendation in 2011 that there should be sub-categorisaion and the Parliamentary Standing Committee had also given such a recommendation.
The Supreme Court, in its November 1992 order, had observed that there is no Constitutional or legal bar to a state categorising backward classes as backward or more backward.
The Minister said 11 states have already implemented the sub-categorisation for state level services. These are Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Bihar, Jharkhand, Puducherry, Haryana, Karnataka, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Jammu and Kashmir (for Jammu region).
On whether the government is going to review the reservation mechanism, Jaitley said: “There is no such proposal… there will be no review.”
On caste census, Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Thawarchand Gehlot, who was also present at the press meet, said the information about the census is with the Home Ministry.
He said the central OBC list has over 5,000 castes and communities.
—IANS