Don’t administer oath to MLAs from ST seats: Gujjars to J&K L-G Sinha

Members of Gujjars and Bakerwal community have urged the Lt Governor not to administer oath to the candidates who won from nine seats reserved for the Scheduled Tribes (ST) community due to a “blunder” by allowing Pahari community to contest from these seats.

At a press conference in Jammu on Sunday, All J&K Gujjar-Bakerwal Co-ordination Committee members claimed that the recently held elections in J&K were in violation of the Constitutional provisions. Committee chairman Mohammad Anwar Chowdhary said constituencies including Surankote, Mendhar, Budhal, Thanamandi, Rajouri, Gulabgarh, Kangan, Kokarnag and Gurez were reserved for communities that were declared ST in 1991.

He claimed that these constituencies were reserved on the basis of Delimitation Commission’s recommendation made in 2022 according to the last census held in 2011. He added that some other people (Paharis) were declared ST this year, but no political reservation was recommended for them. Paharis were given the quota under ST category this year which resulted in protest demonstration by Gujjars and Bakerwals who were already enjoying the ST reservation.

“After the Abrogation of Article 370, the Central laws were made applicable to J&K and consequently a commission, headed by Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai (retd), was constituted for the delimitation of constituencies. This Commission reserved nine Assembly seats for STs according to the 2011 census. Later on, some more communities were granted ST status and according to the notification and the decision of the government they were provided 10% separate reservation,” said Chowdhary.

The leaders of Gujjar community claimed that since there has been no new census after 2011 as such no political reservation was given to the people who were declared ST this year. “But when the elections were announced, the newly-declared ST people having no political reservation filed nominations on these nine reserved seats,” the leaders said.

The Gujjar leaders have submitted a memorandum to L-G Manoj Sinha and copies of the same have been forwarded to the Election Commission. In their memorandum, the Gujjar and Bakerwal leaders have demanded that no candidate should be administered oath from these nine constituencies as the “entire procedure since nomination has been compromised”, the leaders alleged.