Hyderabad: Stage is set for the daylong historic special session of Telangana Legislative Assembly on Sunday to debate and pass the Telangana State Reservation Bill.
The State cabinet, which met at the Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao’s camp office Pragati Bhavan on Saturday, cleared the draft bill increasing the reservation for the Backward Classes (E) or economically backward Muslims to 12 per cent and for the Scheduled Tribes to 10 per cent.
This was the second meeting of the cabinet to discuss the matter. In the earlier meeting, the cabinet accepted the recommendations of the state Backward Classes Commission and Chellappa Commission reports on the socioeconomic backwardness among Muslims and Scheduled Tribes. Both the commission had recommended increasing the reservation for both the groups.
The special session was likely to see some heated moments as the BJP with five members in 119-member House has decided to oppose the bill tooth and nail.
The party, describing the move as “communal reservation” and unconstitutional, has called for statewide protest from Monday.
Senior BJP leader and union minister M. Venkaiah Naidu warned that it was a religion-based reservation and it will lead to creation of another Pakistan and create social unrest in the country.
Addressing a meeting organised by the BJP on the birth anniversary of Dr B.R. Ambedkar in the city on Friday, Venkaiah Naidu said the BJP had always been opposing the religion-based reservation. He recalled that earlier it had opposed a similar move by the then chief ministers of Andhra Pradesh N. Chandrababu Naidu and Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy.
“We will oppose any such move because it will lead to creation of another Pakistan. It will be an all-India policy of the BJP. It is not the policy of the Telangana unit of the BJP,” he said.
While the passage of the bill increasing the reservation for the backward groups of Muslims from present 4 per cent to 12 per cent will be a mere formality as apart from the ruling TRS, it will also have the support of seven members of MIM. Main opposition Congress and the Telugu Desam were also likely to support the bill.
However, the real test will start after it reaches the Centre for its clearance or when its legality is challenge in the High Court or the Supreme Court.
Given its antipathy towards the idea of reservation for Muslims, Narendra Modi government was unlikely to give its nod to the legislation. It may also face hurdles in the courts like the earlier legislation of 2007 which had given 4 per cent reservation to the backward Muslims. It was struck down as illegal and unconstitutional by the High Court. However, the backward sections of Muslims were continuing to enjoy the benefits of the reservation in both Telangana and Andhra Pradesh as the High Court order was stayed by the Supreme Court.
Now the matter was pending before the constitutional bench of the Supreme Court.
Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has said he will fight it out both with the Centre and if necessary in the courts as there cannot be two different standards for different states. He questioned that if the many states including Tamil Nadu can give 69 per cent or more reservation, why Telangana cannot have it and when many other states have reservation for backward sections of Muslims, why it cannot be done in Telangana.
He said it was necessary to increase the quota for backward Muslims as their population had increased in bifurcated Telangana and 80 per cent of them were very poor.
