Bihar Assembly unanimously passes bill for 65% caste quota, past Supreme Court cap

News Network

November 9, 2023

Patna, Nov 9: The Bihar Assembly on Thursday unanimously passed a bill to increase reservations for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes, and Extremely Backward Classes in state jobs and educational institutions to 65 per cent. This is well past the Supreme Court's 50 per cent cap.

The amended bill will now have to be signed off by Governor Rajendra Arlekar before it is law.

The amendments were passed amid ruckus inside and outside the Bihar Assembly - over Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's remark this week on women's education and population control.

Under the revised quotas, Scheduled Caste candidates will have 20 per cent reservation, while those from OBCs and EBCs will get 18 and 25 per cent - a significant increase from the earlier (combined) 30 per cent. Reservation of two per cent has been proposed for ST candidates.

At present there is 18 per cent reservation for EBCs and 12 per cent for Backward Classes, 16 per cent for Scheduled Castes, and one per cent for Scheduled Tribes.

The existing three per cent reservation for women from backward classes has been scrapped.

The amended bill excludes the central government's mandatory 10 per cent reservation for individuals from Economically Weaker Sections, and will take total quotas to 75 per cent.

Nitish Kumar had proposed the amendment on Tuesday, hours after his government tabled the full report of the contentious state-wide caste survey. The report said 36 per cent of the Bihar's 13.1 crore people are from EBCs and 27.1 per cent are from Backward Classes.

Of the rest, 19.7 per cent are from Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes make up 1.7 per cent of the population. The General Category accounts for 15.5 per cent of the population, the report said.

This means that over 60 per cent of Bihar hails from OBCs or EBCs.

Data from the survey was presented amid BJP claims that data about population of the Yadav - to which Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav belongs - and Muslim communities was manipulated.

The Yadav community, which will benefit from 18 per cent reservation for OBC groups, is the largest sub-group, accounting for 14.27 per cent of the category.

The report also said that 42 per cent of all Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe families live in poverty, and that 34 per cent of all families in the state survive on less than ₹ 6,000 per month.

Also according to the data, less than six per cent of individuals from Scheduled Castes had finished their schooling; i.e., cleared Class 11 and Class 12.

The report was initially criticised by the BJP; in a sharp response hours after data was released, Prime Minister Narendra Modi accused the opposition of "trying to divide the country in the name of caste".

Last week, though, Union Home Minister Amit Shah declared the BJP remains open to the idea of a nation-wide caste census, so long as due diligence is done.

The data - coming months before next year's Lok Sabha poll - underlines the electoral importance of OBCs and marginalised communities - both for the BJP, which has opposed calls for a national caste census, and the opposition, which has been increasingly more and more vocal on the subject.

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Hundreds of Palestinian kids kidnapped, imprisoned, tortured by Israel: UN expert expresses shock

News Network

November 14,2024

The UN special rapporteur for Palestine has slammed Israel’s parliament for passing a law authorizing the detention of Palestinian children, who are “tormented often beyond the breaking point” in Israeli custody.

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the rights situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, in a Thursday post on X, characterized the experiences of Palestinian minors in Israeli detention as extreme and often inhumane.

The UN expert highlighted the grave impact of this policy, noting that up to 700 Palestinian minors are taken into custody each year, a practice she described as part of an unlawful occupation that views these children as potential threats.

Albanese said Palestinian minors in Israeli custody are “tormented often beyond the breaking point” and that “generations of Palestinians will carry the scars and trauma from the Israeli mass incarceration system.”

She further criticized the international community for its inaction, suggesting that ongoing diplomatic efforts, which often rely on the idea of resuming negotiations for peace, have contributed to normalizing such human rights violations against Palestinian children and the broader population.

The comments by Albanese came in response to Israel’s parliament (Knesset) passing a law on November 7 that authorizes the detention of Palestinian children under the age of 14 for “terrorism or terrorist activities.”

Under the legislation, a temporary five-year measure, once the individuals turn 14, they will be transferred to adult prison to continue serving their sentences.

Additionally, the law allows for a three-year clause that enables courts to incarcerate minors in adult prisons for up to 10 days if they are considered dangerous. Courts have the authority to extend this duration if necessary, according to the Knesset.

The legislation underscores a shift in the treatment of minors and raises alarms among human rights advocates regarding the legal and ethical ramifications of detaining children and the conditions under which they may be held.

Thousands of Palestinians, including hundreds of children and women, are currently in Israeli jails—around one-third without charge or trial. Also, an unknown number are arbitrarily held following a wave of arrests in the wake of the regime's genocidal war on Gaza.

Since the onset of the Gaza war, the Israeli regime, under the supervision of extremist minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, has turned prisons and detention centers into “death chambers,” the ministry of detainees and ex-detainees’ affairs in Gaza says.

Violence, extreme hunger, humiliation, and other forms of abuse of Palestinian prisoners have been normalized across Israel’s jail system, reports indicate.

Over 270 Palestinian minors are being detained by Israeli authorities, in violation of UN resolutions and international treaties that forbid the incarceration of children, as reported by Palestinian rights organizations.

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