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| Minority report | | Sachar will not mainstream the Muslim | |
Now that the report of the High Level Committee led by Justice (retired) Rajinder Sachar has been submitted to the Prime Minister - never mind the unwarranted press leaks in the interregnum - it would be appropriate to discuss it with due sobriety. At one level the report is an unexceptionable census of the Indian Muslim community. As a data collector, the Sachar panel has done a good job - if one forgives its egregious attempt to involve the Indian Army in its Muslim head-count - of collating information from a variety of States and Union Government institutions. While he has not explicitly suggested quotas for Muslims, Justice Sachar has hinted at this and said the decision is, ultimately, that of the Government. Religion-based quotas would, of course, require a constitutional amendment, one the United Progressive Alliance may not have parliamentary numbers to push through. Yet, given the fairly single-minded Congress focus on Muslim voters in the past two years, it is expected an affirmative action scheme just short of reservations will form the post-Sachar "action taken report", as it were. The Government may decide it is politically useful to package welfare schemes as exclusively designed to benefit Muslims. |
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