SRINAGAR: A cabinet sub-committee appointed to examine reservation grievances has submitted its report to the Council of Ministers and recommended steps to synchronise quota posts in Jammu and Kashmir with the Supreme Court’s guidance that total reservation should generally not exceed 50 per cent, the government told the Assembly.
The reply said the subcommittee was constituted by the government to examine grievances projected by various entities and to review the position of reservation in the Union territory. The committee has now forwarded its findings to the Council of Ministers, and the report is “presently under consideration before the competent authority”, the Social Welfare Department, Jammu and Kashmir, informed the House. The Supreme Court of India has, in earlier judgments, held that total reservation should not ordinarily exceed 50 per cent to preserve adequate representation for open merit candidates; the subcommittee’s work is framed against that jurisprudence.
The government’s account confined itself to procedure; it said the Cabinet subcommittee was set up to examine the grievances and that its report had been submitted for ministerial consideration. The official reply did not, however, disclose the report’s recommendations in detail, nor did it provide a timetable for any administrative or legislative action that might follow.
Pertinently, students have repeatedly expressed discontent over the reservation policy in Jammu and Kashmir.
