Telangana likely to categorise STs, KCR to call quota meet after WTC

Hyderabad: The Telangana state government is seriously considering categorisation of Scheduled Tribes (ST) in order to break the impasse between Adivasis and Lambadas and to ensure equitable opportunities in education and employment to all tribals.

The Adivasis are alleging that Lambadas are cornering ST reservation benefits and are demanding that the government remove Lambadas from the list.

The government is worried that removing Lambadas from the ST list would complicate matters, and is seriously considering categorising the STs to create sub-caste groups based on social and economic status and extend reservations to all sections accordingly.

KCR to call quota meet after World Telugu Conference
Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao will convene a meeting with ST public representatives and community leaders after the World Telugu Conference ends this week and put the categorisation proposal before them. The government wants to appoint a commission of inquiry to recommend categorisation of STs with a time-frame of six months.

At present, there are five categories of BCs in the state (A,B,C,D,E) and the 29 per cent reservation quota is distributed among them. There is a long pending demand for categorisation of Scheduled Caste (SC) too and the TS Assembly has passed a resolution to this effect and sent it to the Centre for approval, where it has been pending for a long time. ST categorisation too will need approval of the Centre. The government wants to complete all the formalities on ST categorisation and send it to the Centre, so that it can tell the tribal communities that it is pending with New Delhi. Mr Rao discussed these issues with ministers Jogu Ramanna, A Indrakaran Reddy, and A. Chandulal at a meeting at Pragathi Bhavan on Saturday.

Sources in the Chief Minister’s Office said that Mr Rao would convene a meeting of ST representatives of all political parties as well community leaders to decide how to go about resolving the reservations tussle between Adivasis and Lambadas. There are about 35 castes within Scheduled Tribes. Adivasis allege that only the Lambadas, who migrated from other states to undivided Andhra Pradesh earlier, and now into Telangana state just so that they could avail of the reservation benefits, were cornering a major share of the quota and depriving other castes.

They argue that Lam-badas in other states are categorised as BCs or OBCs and it is to get ST status that they are migrating to Telangana. They have demanded that the government not issue Lambadas ST caste certificates. STs have 6 per cent quota in Telangana. The state Assembly passed an Act this year increasing the quota to 10 per cent, but the Centre’s approval is awaited since the overall quota limit has crossed the 50 per cent mandated by the Supreme Court.