Stay on quotas is 'absurd', says Sharad Yadav
Mar 30, 2007 - 5:18:26 PM
|
|
|
Raghuvansh Prasad Singh was more restrained in his criticism. 'It is immaterial whether OBCs constitute 54 or 47 percent of the country's population. They are certainly more than 27 percent, so where is the question of any dispute on this account?
|
By IANS,
[RxPG] New Delhi, March 30 - The Supreme Court ruling staying reservations in higher educational institutes like IITs and IIMs is 'unfortunate, unconstitutional and absurd', Janata Dal-United - president Sharad Pawar said Friday.
Yadav joined his Rashtriya Janata Dal - colleague and Rural Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh in criticising the Supreme Court order Thursday that stayed till August the 27 percent quota for other backward classes - in centrally run educational institutions.
A furious Yadav also called for setting up a 'judicial council' to go into the selection of judges.
'The government should call all the parties to discuss the constitution of a judicial council. Just as there is a UPSC - to select officers for the bureaucracy, there should be a judicial council for the selection of judges,' Yadav told a press conference.
He said a nine-judge bench of the Supreme Court had upheld the principle of reservation earlier but judges in this case were 'using the same phrases as the petitioning anti-reservation students of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences.
'The reasons given to stay the order are unfortunate, unconstitutional and absurd,' said Yadav, chief lieutenant of former prime minister V.P. Singh when he implemented the Mandal Commission.
'It is ironic that it - has not implemented the constitutional provision of reservations for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and OBCs in the higher judiciary. Now it is time for parliament to take proper steps so the reservation policy is implemented in all high courts and the Supreme Court of India.'
The JD-U president also struck a note independent of BJP, which had blamed the government for mishandling the whole issue.
He said there are some elements within the Congress trying to 'sabotage' reservations and named Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi. But he added that Human Resource Development Minister Arjun Singh is making a 'sincere effort'.
Raghuvansh Prasad Singh was more restrained in his criticism. 'It is immaterial whether OBCs constitute 54 or 47 percent of the country's population. They are certainly more than 27 percent, so where is the question of any dispute on this account?
'The basis of the consensual decision of parliament, granting OBC reservation in educational institutions, was the Supreme Court judgment of 1991 which accepted and approved 27 reservation in services,' said Singh.
|
Subscribe to India Politics Newsletter
|
|
E-mail Address:
|
|
Feedback
|
For any corrections of factual information, to contact the editors or to send
any medical news or health news press releases, use
feedback form
|
Top of Page
|
