SC gives Centre 4 weeks to respond to plea challenging minority panel’s validity

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday sought the Centre’s response to a plea challenging the National Commission for Minorities (NCM)’s constitutional validity.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday sought the Centre’s response to a plea challenging the National Commission for Minorities (NCM)’s constitutional validity. It gave four weeks to the Centre to respond and listed the matter for hearing next in March.

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In their plea, six petitioners claiming to be Sanatan Vedic Dharam followers have sought the scrapping of the National Commission for Minorities Act that governs the panel and to restrain the Centre from implementing and spending government funds on 14 schemes for the minorities.

When asked to give his views on the matter, attorney general K K Venugopal told the court that the issue involves constitutional questions and that a five-judge constitution bench should hear it.

The petitioners have alleged the Hindu community was being discriminated against on the grounds of religion as a number of government schemes favour certain religious minority communities even as the Constitution does not provide for special provisions in the name of religion.

The petitioners have pleaded that citizens cannot be forced to pay taxes for the promotion of religious minorities as it violates the right to equality under the Constitution’s Article 14, the prohibition against discrimination under Article 15 and freedom against payment of taxes for promotion of any particular religion under Article 27.

The NCM was set up in 1992 and Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, and Zoroastrians have been notified as minority communities. States like Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Delhi, Jharkhand, and Karnataka have also set up state minorities’ commissions. “The functions of these Commissions, inter-alia, are to safeguard and protect the interests of minorities provided in the Constitution and laws enacted by Parliament and the State Legislatures,’’ according to the NCM website. “Aggrieved persons belonging to the minority communities may approach the concerned State Minorities Commissions for redressal of their grievances. They may also send their representations, to the National Commission for Minorities, after exhausting all remedies available to them.”

The petitioners have challenged the 14 central schemes for the benefit of religious minorities for which “Rs 4,700 crore of taxpayers money” was being spent in the current financial year.

They have argued that special benefits and advantages under Constitution’s Article 15(4) can be provided only to communities found to be socially and educationally backward. No religion or religious groups can be promoted using tax payer’s money and, therefore, no minority commission can be created, they argued.

The petitioners have underlined the government cannot promote “minoritism”, show inclination towards minorities and initiate beneficial schemes for them. Such an action will be detrimental for India’s sovereignty and integrity of and sow seeds for another division, the petitioners argued.

“Right to equality, equal protection of the law, rule of law and a secular state are basic pillars of Indian Constitution,” the petition says.

“Our bone of contention before the Supreme Court is that religious minority cannot be treated to be a class and, therefore, money spent in their favour would be violative of Articles 14, 15 and 27. The petition raises pertinent issues which will have a significant bearing on the interpretation of minority rights”, advocate for the petitioners, Vishnu Shankar Jain told HT.