New Delhi. Recently, the Kolkata High Court cancelled all the certificates issued to people after 2010 in the state under the Other Backward Classes category (OBC). This judgment, which came in the middle of the Lok Sabha elections, stirred up not only the state but also the country’s politics. This is because under OBC, many parties including Mamta Banerjee, Congress and opposition parties had given reservation to Muslims in this category. The Bharatiya Janata Party and other opposition parties are busy making it an election issue in their own way. Meanwhile, the big question is that in how many states of the country has reservation been given to the Muslim community? In which state, what percentage of Muslim reservation has been arranged? Let us tell you about it.
In fact, not one, two or three but 9 states of the country have provision for Muslim reservation. Currently, this provision exists in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka (court stay), Bengal (now cancelled), Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Rajasthan. In Kerala, 8% seats in education and 10% seats in jobs are reserved for the Muslim community. Whereas, in Tamil Nadu, Muslims are given 3.5% reservation. In Karnataka, 4% reservation was given to Muslims, which was abolished by the BJP government. Now, as soon as Congress came to power in the state, it tried to implement Muslim reservation again, on which the court put a stay.
How much reservation in Telangana-Andhra?
In Telangana, Muslims have 4 percent reservation in OBC category. In Andhra Pradesh, the quota of Muslim reservation in OBC reservation is 7% to 10%. If we talk about Uttar Pradesh, here 28 Muslim castes are getting OBC reservation. Apart from this, Muslims have been included in OBC reservation on the basis of caste in many states including Bihar, Rajasthan.
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When did religion-based reservation come for the first time?
Religion-based reservation was first implemented in 1936 in Kerala, which was then the Travancore-Kochi state. In 1952, it was replaced by communal reservation with 45%, 35% reservation was allotted to OBCs, which also included Muslims. After the reorganization of Kerala in 1956, the Left government increased the percentage of reservation to 50, which included 40% reservation for OBCs. The government created a SUB-QUOTA within OBCs, in which the share of Muslims was 10%, while the Constitution of India does not provide for reservation on the basis of religion. The Constitution maker Baba Saheb Ambedkar himself used to say that reservation cannot be given on the basis of religion.
What if a Dalit accepts Islam?
Apart from this, if a Dalit person leaves Hinduism and accepts Islam or Christianity, will he get the benefit of reservation? This matter is also in the Supreme Court. Apart from this, the Supreme Court is also yet to decide on the order of the Constitution which states that people of any religion other than Dalits of Hindu, Sikh and Buddhist religions cannot be given the status of Scheduled Caste. It was also said in the order that Christianity and Islam have been excluded from the order because there is no untouchability and caste system in these two religions.
Tags: 2024 Lok Sabha Elections, Muslim reservation, Political news
FIRST PUBLISHED : May 24, 2024, 22:23 IST