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TN okays 7% quota bill for Muslims

The Tamil Nadu assembly on Monday passed a bill providing 7% special reservation for Christians and Muslims (3.5% each) in education and employment.

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CHENNAI: The Tamil Nadu assembly on Monday passed a bill providing 7% special reservation for Christians and Muslims (3.5% each) in education and employment.

Earlier, the government had promulgated an ordinance in this regard, marking the implementation of the exclusive reservation from September 15, the birthday of DMK founder and former chief minister Anna Durai. 

The 7% reservation would be within the 30 % quota for backward classes, under which Christians and Muslims come.

Reservation for minorities was one of the election promises of the DMK. Dubbing it a Ramzan gift for the minorities, Karunanidhi said: “I have not implemented this expecting applause... this is but an effort to ensure the rights of the oppressed,” he said.

Even as the minority representatives are visibly happy with the bill, some point out the irony of the Christian community standing to lose under the new quota system. “The 3.5 % reservation would be, in proportion to the Christian population in the state, less beneficial to the community than what it enjoys under the 30% reservation for the backward classes,” says senior lawyer KM Vijayan, who is appearing in a case against the minority quota.

The legal validity of the bill will also be put to test in the coming days as the Madras High Court had already taken on file a petition against the earlier ordinance. Though Karunanidhi has chosen to go by the Kerala model, providing reservation within reservation, the bill could be questioned for its ‘reservation on the basis of religion’.

The Andhra Pradesh high court had struck down a similar exclusive reservation of 5% of Muslims and Christians, saying reservation on the basis of religion is against the Constitution.
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