http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/goa/ST/SC/OBC-candidates-will-get-seat-quota-at-civic-polls/articleshow/6225794.cms
ST/SC/OBC candidates will get seat quota at civic polls
Jul 28, 2010, 06.22am IST
PANAJI: Urban development minister Joaquim Alemao assured the Goa
assembly of ensuring appropriate reservation for candidates from
scheduled tribes (ST) and other backward classes (OBC) in every
municipal council for the ensuing polls despite a lack of authentic
data on their population.
Alemao was replying to a calling attention motion tabled by MLA
Dayanand Narvekar in the house on Tuesday, raising apprehensions among
the ST/SC/OBC communities that the ensuing municipal elections in the
state would be he held without following the state policy of reserving
seats for them. "About 19.5% of seats will be reserved for OBCs, 12%
for STs and 2% for SCs," the minister said.
Explaining the criteria for reservation of seats for SCs, STs and
OBCs, as well as women candidates, the minister said it was provided
in Section 9 of the Municipalities Act. "The number of seats, if any,
to be reserved for SC, ST and OBC candidates so that such number shall
bear as nearly as may be, the same proportion to the number of elected
councilors, as the population of these three communities in the
municipal area bears to the total population of that area and not less
than one third of such seats shall be reserved for women and such
seats shall be allotted by rotation to different wards in a municipal
area," he said.
The population is ascertained from figures of the last census or, if
not, authentic government records. However, regarding reservation for
SCs, Alemao said their population in urban areas is 2%, which is
insufficient to reserve a single ward in any of the municipal
councils.
Further, the ST categories were notified in 2003. The social welfare
department had published a survey report on the ST population in 2004,
but it was challenged in the high court in 2007. Till date, the Goa
state commission for backward classes has not furnished any figures of
their population, although it had been directed by the court to
conduct a re-survey by July 2, 2007.
Narvekar said reservation for OBCs, STs and STs is done without any
data on their population being available because it is considered a
social obligation. "In this case, too, these communities should not be
penalized because of acts of omission and commission by some agency,"
he said.
CM Digambar Kamat said the lack of data was a handicap but the
government had reserved seats in elections so that they should not be
deprived of their rights. Alemao assured the house that justice would
be meted out to these communities in the civic polls.
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