Government will implement recommendations of SC categorisation panel: Damodar Rajanarasimha
Rajnarsimha said the categorisation was made possible owing to combined efforts of the Madiga community and the social justice agenda of the Congress, and Chief Minister Revanth Reddy had made it a reality
Hyderabad: Minister Damodar Rajanarsimha said the government would implement the recommendations of the commission on categorisation of sub-castes of the Scheduled Castes community, as it had been done scientifically. He said that those who were trying to scuttle the process of categorisation would be taught a lesson by the people.
The minister made the comments while addressing leaders of the Madiga community and allied caste groups. “I will not be cowed down by allegations of betraying the community and will face them legally. The categorisation has already been delayed,” he said.
Rajnarsimha said the categorisation was made possible owing to combined efforts of the Madiga community and the social justice agenda of the Congress, and Chief Minister Revanth Reddy had made it a reality. “It was stuck in legal issues in the Supreme Court. The Congress promised categorisation in its Kamareddy Declaration in the presence of party president Mallikarjun Kharge,” he noted.
Rajnarsimha said the government had government deployed the best advocates in the Supreme Court to argue in favour of categorisation. “I kept track of the arguments personally, and I travelled to Delhi for the hearings,” he said.
Rajnarsimha said the Chief Minister had in the Assembly spoken in favour of the judgment and promised to implement it. A Cabinet sub-committee was appointed for the purpose and the matter was studied by one-man commission headed by a retired High Court judge Dr Justice Shameem Akhtar. Its recommendation to identify a creamy layer among the SCs was rejected.
It identified 59 castes in total and gave 9.8 percent reservation for Madigas and its sub castes. “Those who want to put spokes in this are now casting aspersions on me personally,” the minister stated.
Those who want to create a wedge between the Mala and the Madigas communities for their own political survival will be taught a lesson by the people, Rajnarsimha said. “The Madiga community should now surge ahead from being drum beaters and hold computers in their hands and live with dignity,” he said.
