Govt announces committee for quota

New Delhi: Moving quickly to bring an end to the quota imbroglio, Government on Monday announced a 13-member committee headed by senior Congress MP Veerappa Moily to look into issue of implementation of 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in higher education institutions.

The committee will also look into requirements for increasing seats without reducing the number in general category.

Approved by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the Oversight Committee with secretaries from the ministries of HRD, Health and Family Welfare, Agriculture and Finance, has been asked to submit its report by August 31, this year.

The committee includes B Mungekar, Member, Planning Commission, R Mashelkar, Director General, CSIR, S K Thorat, UGC Chairman, R A Yadav, Vice Chairman, AICTE, N K Ganguly, Director General, ICMR, G Mohan Gopal, former VC, National Law School and R V Vaidyanatha Ayyar, former Secretary.

Simultaneously, the Government also appointed three groups to go into specific details about universities and institutes regarding the course of action for giving effect to OBC quota in a time-bound manner.

Under the terms of reference, the groups will identify the courses at undergraduate and post-graduate level in each of the institutions and universities and student intake for academic session 2007-08.

The groups have also been asked to identify the total number of OBCs and consequently to other categories in each course.

Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram said the Centre would keep its word not to disturb the present number of seats for general category in Central educational institutions, when the reservation was implemented.

Chidambaram, a member of the ministerial committee, which had held talks with the striking medicos, told reporters that there was no question of going back on the decision to give 27 per cent reservation to OBCs.

The Government was committed to increasing the number of seats under the general category and there was no need for any apprehension among the students over this, he said.

"There is no need for any agitation as the interests of those who get seats under the open competition is protected," he said, denying the charge of some anti-quota groups that the reservation was being implemented with "vote bank politics in mind."

If the Government wanted to ameliorate the lot of the backward community, where was the question of vote bank politics, he asked.