Moily favours reservation for Muslims

Moily, heading the Administrative Reforms Commission, said reservation for Muslims should have been part of the Constitution.

Amidst the raging controversy over quotas, a senior Congress leader has said that reservation for Muslims should have been part of the Constitution.

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"Dr BR Ambedkar, one of the founding fathers of the Constitution, had favoured in the draft of the Constitution Article 296 the benefit of minorities, especially Muslims. After partition that was abandoned. It should have found a place in the Constitution," Veerappa Moily, heading the Administrative Reforms Commission, said.

At the same time, he said inspite of the absence of the provision, the Muslims could be put in the "mainstream" with OBCs to get quota benefit.

The contention of Moily, who headed the Oversight Committee that went into the issue of reservations for OBCs in educational institutions, is that the backward classes are getting the quota benefit not because they belonged to any religion, but they were socially and educationally backward.

Observing that there were people in minority communities more backward than the OBCs, he said that "if they (Muslims) fulfill the criteria for backward class as laid down under the clause of socially and educationally backward, they should definitely be put in the mainstream with OBC".