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PMK presses for new law on Vanniyar quota
After meeting Stalin at the state secretariat in Chennai, Ramadoss told reporters that the PMK’s general body held an emergency meeting on Sunday over the matter of Vanniyar community quota.
Days after the Supreme Court verdict that struck down Tamil Nadu law providing 10.5% internal reservation to the Vanniyar community, caste-based party Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) called on chief minister M K Stalin to discuss the further course of action.
On Friday, a delegation led by PMK leader and former Union health minister Anbumani Ramadoss submitted a request to Stalin to bring a new law for the quota and thanked him for announcing that the Tamil Nadu government would ensure 10.5% reservation for the community. He made the announcement at the state assembly on Thursday.
“Though the 2021 Act was brought by the AIADMK, the government engaged senior counsels Rakesh Dwivedi, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Mukul Rohatgi and P Wilson to effectively argue the case since it was the DMK that had ensured 20% reservation for MBCs (Most Backward Classes),” Stalin said in the assembly on April 7. “But both the Madras High Court and the Supreme Court struck down the reservation as the AIADMK government brought the legislation in haste. The SC cited a clear lack of data.” Stalin had said that the state would consult legal experts on the matter.
After meeting Stalin at the state secretariat in Chennai, Ramadoss told reporters that the PMK’s general body held an emergency meeting on Sunday over the matter. “We passed a resolution in the meeting that a seven-member committee headed by me will meet the CM and urge him to draw in the positive aspects from the SC verdict and take the next steps,” Ramadoss said.
“The SC verdict clearly states that there is no obstruction to providing a separate reservation for Vanniyars but that has to be justified.”
He added that the SC has said that it can be justified to use data to prove the backwardness of Vanniayars, thereby necessitating the quota and the state has the powers to do this. “We have data now but we need more data and collate it,” he said. “With that very soon, we asked the CM to bring in a fresh legislation in the assembly.”
On March 31, the Supreme Court struck down Tamil Nadu’s law carving out a 10.5% reservation for the Vanniyar community within the existing 20% reservation for Most Backward Classes (MBCs) thereby upholding the Madras High Court verdict that it is unconstitutional.
This legislation for Vanniyars to benefit in public education and employment was notified by the previous government led by AIADMK on February 26, 2021, a few hours before assembly elections.
After the present DMK government took over in May, it issued a government order in June to fully implement the reservation following which 35 petitions (who belong to various castes in MBCs) were moved in the Madras HC arguing that this Vanniyars’ reservation will leave little for the 115 other castes under the MBCs.
The Madras HC verdict struck down the reservation, which was then challenged by the state government, the PMK and a batch of other petitioners in the Supreme Court.
Advocate and PMK’s spokesperson K Balu, who is one of the petitioners in the SC, had told HT after the verdict that the party has asked the state government to conduct a caste-based census. “We have asked the DMK to bring in a new legislature after the census,” Balu said. “The verdict gives room for options.”
Minister for water resources Duraimurugan, minister for backward classes welfare R S Rajakannappan and PMK leader G K Mani were among those present in the meeting on Friday.
