14.2.19

Rajasthan gives Gujjars 5% job, education quota

In the backdrop of the ongoing Gujjar agitation, the Rajasthan assembly passed a bill to give a separate 5% quota in jobs and educational institutions to Gujjars and four other communities by clubbing them as “more backward class” within the other backward class. The bill also provides for increasing the income limit for defining creamy layer in OBC from Rs.2.5 lakh to Rs.8 lakh per annum. Not just the ‘Gujjar quota’, the Assembly on Wednesday also gave its nod for 10% EWS (economically weaker section) quota approved by the Centre, thereby taking the total reservation in Rajasthan to 64%.

The bill increased the OBC reservation from the present 21% to 26% with 5% exclusive quota for Gujjars, Banjaras, Gadia Lohars, Raikas and Gadarias under MBC. However, Gujjars continued their agitation on Wednesday, demanding that they first be shown a copy of the bill with the governor’s signature.

The assembly also passed a unanimous resolution, requesting the Centre to put the bill titled “Rajasthan Backward Classes (Reservation of Seats in Educational Institutes in the State and of Appointments and Posts in Services under the State) Amendment Bill, 2019” in Schedule IX of the Constitution to avoid judicial scrutiny. The state had given 5% quota to Gujjars and the four other communities by breaching the 50% cap set by the Supreme Court on three different occasions in the past, but every time those Acts were struck down or stayed by courts.

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