Government is committed to providing 4.5 precent job reservation to backward Muslims and trying to expedite the matter pending before the Supreme Court, Minority Affairs Minister K Rahman Khan said today.
Addressing National Editors's Conference here, Khan said the reservation for backward Muslims was a promise made by Congress in its election manifesto.
"We had said in our manifesto that we will provide reservation to backward Muslims as per the Karnataka and Kerala mode of quota within quota. In both the states, it has been upheld by the courts.
"After the Andhra Pradesh High Court order rejecting it, the matter is now before the Supreme Court. We are trying to expedite the matter. We are committed to it," Khan said.
The decision taken by the Union Cabinet on December 23, 2011 and latter notified aimed at carving out a sub-quota of 4.5 per cent for minorities within the 27 per cent reservation for OBCs.
The decision was based on the recommendation of Rangnath Mishra-headed National Commission for Religious and Linguistic Minorities and taken a few months before the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.
Khan also rejected the charge that the recommendations of Sachar Committee were not implemented fully and said 69 of the 72 recommendations out of a total 76 of the committee have already been implemented while work is in progress on other three including setting up of an Equal Opportunity Commission, National Data Bank and Diversity Index.
Admitting lack of speed in implementation of schemes and shorcomings in their monitoring, the minister said he is going to "revamp" the entire monitoring system.
