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Malegaon:
Strongly mooting the view that reservation in India is actually
based on religion, Maulana Sayyad Mohammad Wali Rahmani dared the
government to get a resolution on Muslim reservation passed in the
parliament instead of playing with the issue.
“It is misleading to say that the
constitution does not allow reservation on the basis of religion.
The reservation was based on the religion when it was introduced for
SCs, STs and other Backward classes and even now when it is proposed
for Muslims”, Maulana Rahmani who is the General Secretary of All
India Muslim Personal Board (AIMPLB) and founder of Rahmani
Foundation, Bihar said while addressing the media in Malegaon on
February 23 after winding his two-day visit to the textile town in
North Maharashtra dominated by Muslims.
“The matter is clear and free from any
ambiguity. If the Government is really serious about the reservation
giving to the Muslims as it claims, it should move a resolution and
get it passed in the Parliament”, he stressed.
To prove his point, Maulana Rahmani
recalled how to assuage the apprehensions raised by few Labour Party
Leaders in Britain, Sardar Patel in the Constituent Assembly before
independence mooted the idea of reservation for Muslims.
“The concept of reservation when it
was introduced initially was for the Muslims to safeguard their
interests in India after the partition and it was mooted by Sardar
Patel in the Constituent Assembly in reply to the apprehensions
raised by a Labour Party leader in Britain”, he said.
“However”, he added, “After the Muslim
leaders during those times relying on the promises made by
Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Patel declined to accept the reservation
for Muslims, it was introduced for SCs, STs and other Backward
classes.”
Arguing that the basis of the
reservation in its present form is also the religion, he said, “If a
person from SC or ST converts from Hinduism to Islam, he will not be
eligible for reservation unless he reconverts to his or her previous
religion. This shows that reservation even today is based on the
religion.”
Significantly, a kind of consensus is
building among the minorities including Christians, Budhist, Sikhs
and Muslims ever since Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission report
was tabled in the Parliament.
"Reservation is the right of Muslims.
When other backward and under privileged sections of the society are
being offered the Reservations, why not the Muslims?", M.J. Akbar
Prominent Journalist & Columnist asked recently while delivering an
extension lecture at Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU).
Former MP and President of Majlis
Mushawerat Syed Shahabuddin also took the stand that Muslims and
other backward sections ask for reservation not as a favour but as a
democratic fundamental right which cannot be denied.
“The argument raised by certain vested
interest groups against giving reservation to Muslims are baseless
and against the spirit of the Indian Constitution. Muslims are
eligible for reservation because of their relative backwardness and
not because of their religious faith”, Shahabuddin reasoned.
"In fact denying reservation to
Muslims is a discrimination on religious grounds,” Shahabuddin
remarked. He also pointed out that 50 per cent ceiling on total
reservation put by the Supreme Court is not irrevocable and can be
changed.
The Christians groups across the
country including All India Christian Council, the All India
Catholic Union, the United Christian Action and the Union of Dalit
Christian Associations India have also welcomed the Indian Union
Government tabling the report of the Justice Rangnath Misra
Commission in Parliament.
These groups have urged the government
to immediately implement its important recommendation that
Christians and Muslims of Dalit origin be given the same benefits
now given to Scheduled Castes professing Hinduism, Buddhism or
Sikhism as their religion.
At the same time,
Senior Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP) leader Murli Manohar Joshi Tuesday said that
reservation in the name of religion is “unconstitutional” and his
party would oppose it.
“Any reservation in the name of religion is unconstitutional. It’s a
conspiracy to divide the nation. The BJP will oppose this move,”
Joshi said at a press conference here at Kolkata Press Club.
He said the West
Bengal government had decided to adopt the Ranganath Mishra
Commission’s recommendations when the centre has not taken any
concrete decision on it.
“Backwardness in
India has no connection with religion,” he added.
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