124TH Constitution amendment bill passed for providing 10% quota to Economical week section (EWS) for general category over and above the SC/ST/OBC category of 49.5% quota. Bill has been passed by both houses and signed by president on 12-01-2019, by amending article15,16,30 of constitution towards reservation on government jobs and on educational institutions. Now the legislation was known as constitution (103rd amendment) Act, 2019.
While drafting Indian constitution, reservation was made only for SC/ST communities for first 10 years (1951-1961) in objective with social upliftment, however it further extended by all the ruling parties due to vote politics. After Mandal commission report on 1990, scope of reservation extended to other backward classes.
Due to financial incapacity, EWS are excluded from getting seats in higher educational institutions and public employment. If reservation made available based on economic, then it will serve in levelling the financial inequality exist in upper caste and uplift the poor into better financial position. It will also gradually remove the stigma associated with reservation, as it was presumed with the caste-based reservation. On the other hand, there will be lot of challenges associated with EWS act.
On the eligibility criteria for EWS of yearly earning of less than eight lakhs, lot of critics saying that 95% of Indian families are earning more than that. It also breaks the cap of supreme court 50% for reservations and EWS is still legally challenged. Enforcement of this act is a bigger challenge due to financials and diversity of various states and culture associated. It is pure populist initiative as government one side is more moving towards privatization, then providing quota on government jobs on other side is of no use and more contradictory. In reserved caste category also, only upper ladder only got benefited for the last 70 years with the existing reservation system, same trend will continue with EWS and objective of social upliftment of poor will be lost. It is questionable, EWS will reach the needy poor layer or not and helps in social uplifting of poor layers in upper caste. It’s time to introspect current unequal treatment is perfect or not? India being leading promising economy of the globe, it’s time for India to fix the reservation system rather than keep on extending reservation system.
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