MK Faizy, National President of the Social Democratic Party of India stated that exclusion of the OBCs from sub-reservation in the proposed Women’s Reservation Bill is discriminatory and ill-intended. He demanded that proportionate sub-quota should be ensured in the Bill for the OBCs also.
The Union Cabinet has cleared the Women’s Reservation Bill (WRB) in a key meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The Bill seeks to reserve 33% of total number of seats in state legislative Assemblies and Parliament for women.
As per the available reports, sub-reservation for the SCs, STs and the Anglo Indians within this 33% reservation also has been proposed in the bill. Reservation, as envisaged by the architects of the Constitution, is an effective tool to uplift the marginalised and socially backward segments of the society to the mainstream to ensure equity. Women, certainly, are still in the outskirts as far as their representation in legislative bodies are concerned. So, the proposed Bill will help them to involve more in the law-making process.
At the same time, even after seven and half decades of post-colonial era, the marginalised communities for whom reservation was recommended in the Constitution, are sill beyond the mainstream boundary and so, sub-reservation for these communities within the proposed 33% reservation is a step to ensure justice to these communities. Proposal to provide sub-reservation within the 33% reservation for the SCs, STs and the Anglo Indians in the Bill, is a testimony that the government is aware of this fact. But, OBCs have been excluded from this sub-reservation entitlement which prima-facie is discriminatory and ill-intended.
So, to be fair and just to all citizens of the country, sub-reservation for OBCs within the 33% reservation for women also should be ensured, demanded Faizy.
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