The Government of India, on Monday, approved a bill which provides 10 % reservation for the economically weaker sections (EWS) under the General Category.
According to the bill, anyone with an annual income of less than 8 lakhs and 5 acres land is eligible for the reservation quota for admission to educational institutions and getting jobs. The amended bill, approved by the Union Cabinet during a Cabinet meeting, yesterday, will be introduced in the Lok Sabha, today, which is also the last day of the winter session before the general elections.
Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India, in the presence of Vijay Sampla, a Union Minister, Udit Raj, a Member of Parliament (MP) and other MPs, approved the bill and sent it to the Rajya Sabha for approval.
To pass the bill, amendments will be made to Article 15 and 16 of the Indian Constitution. According to Article 15 and 16, reservations are to be made only for the social and educational backward classes of the society.
The final decision regarding the amendments to the bill will be taken by the Supreme Court (SC) and cannot come into effect immediately.
According to sources, the bill is likely to fail in the SC and the Rajya Sabha. Until now, the Government passed reservation bills directed only toward those belonging to social and educational backward classes. In 1993, the Supreme Court gave a judgement stating, only 50 % reservation can be provided to the backward classes for jobs and education.
Speaking about the 10 % reservation bill, Sanjay Hegde, a senior advocate at the SC, said, “The SC has already held 50 % as the limit to reservation. You can’t amend the constitution beyond the basic structure and equality is part of the basic structure. Creating a fresh reservation in open field, you are violating these limitation on exercise of constitutional power.” In addition to it, Jaideep Gupta, another senior advocate, said, “In the past, reservation has been approved only when given for social and educational backwardness and none of them included economic criteria.”
Social media platforms like Twitter are flooded with opinions about the new amendments to the bill. Political leaders like Asaduddin Owaisi, Amar Singh and Satish Acharya took to Twitter to express their views regarding the same.
10% job quota! @newssting1 cartoon #reservationuppercastes pic.twitter.com/nQ4fWOhKK4
— Satish Acharya (@satishacharya) January 8, 2019
All the backward leaders were talking about plight of upper caste poor. But no one actually did any substantial work. It was only demand of natural justice . It’s a bold move & needs a big thank u to be given to our beloved @narendramodi ji. #ReservationUpperCastes #Reservations
— Amar Singh MP (@AmarSinghTweets) January 7, 2019
Reservations are meant to correct historical injustice to Dalits. For poverty alleviation, one may run various schemes but reservations are meant for justice.
Constitution doesn’t permit reservations on economic groundshttps://t.co/KrHNruMXse
— Asaduddin Owaisi (@asadowaisi) January 7, 2019
Stay tuned for further update about the story.
