PIL challenges hike in Bihar quotas, JD(U) prez suspects 'BJP hand'

JD(U) chief expressed confidence that the recently passed legislations raising the quantum of reserved seats to 75%, including 10% quota for economically weaker sections, will be upheld by the court

JD(U) president Rajiv Ranjan Singh "Lalan" on Monday said that he saw "a BJP hand" behind a petition filed in the Patna High Court against the recent hike in quotas for socially deprived castes.

Lalan made the statement reacting to reports that a Public Interest Litigation was filed last week which will come up for hearing in due course.

"It is all the BJP's doing. The party is anti-reservations. It had got its supporters to challenge quotas for extremely backward classes in local body polls. But the design was foiled and municipal elections were held with seats reserved for EBCs," he told reporters here.

"The BJP was again at work when attempts were made to derail the caste survey ordered by the Nitish Kumar government. When petitions filed by BJP supporters could not stand on merit, the Centre chipped in and the Solicitor General of India opposed the survey in the Supreme Court," he added.

The JD(U) chief expressed confidence that the recently passed legislations raising the quantum of reserved seats to 75 per cent, including 10 per cent quota for economically weaker sections, will be upheld by the court.

Meanwhile, senior BJP leader and former Bihar Deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi came out with a statement alleging that the PIL against the hike in quotas was filed at the behest of the ruling Mahagathbandhan in the state to defame his party.

Modi also said that when OBC quotas were first introduced in Bihar in the 1970s, when "the Jan Sangh (BJP's predecessor) was sharing power and the Congress was in opposition".

He also lambasted Congress and the RJD, which helms the Mahagathbandhan, for having held panchayat polls "without reserving seats for the OBCs" and added that "backward classes got their due only after a coalition government, of which a BJP was a part, took over".

Notably, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who dumped the BJP last year, had first formed his government in 2005, with the saffron party as his coalition partner and Modi as his deputy.

The BJP leader also pointed out that "the Narendra Modi government at the Centre, in fact, did the groundwork by introducing 10 per cent EWS quota which breached the 50 per cent cap placed by the Supreme Court. Without this, the Bihar government could never have raised quotas for SCs, STs, OBCs and EBCs".