Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, December 31:
The amended Bill of the Manipur Reservation of Vacancies in Post and Services (for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes) Rules 2006 passed by the Manipur State Assembly in September (15-18) this year is more detrimental to the interest of tribal peoples as it contains many intriguing points and clauses that can be misinterpreted and misuse to their disadvantage, said a memorandum submitted to the Prime Minister by the All Tribal Students' Union Manipur.
The repeated appeals of ATSUM to convene a special session of the Assembly to rectify the disputed sections and clauses have been unheeded.
As such, it is unlikely to have a legally binding reservation policy in Manipur in the near future, noted the memorandum.
As against the agreement signed between ATSUM and the State Government on March 31, 2006, the State Government has been refusing to recruit local candidates as teachers in tribal areas so as to avoid the chronic problem of transfer and absence from the place of posting.
Further, to avoid giving 33 percent reservation to SCs and STs, the State Government has been resorting to various means such as Casual, Contract, Muster Roll, Adhoc, Substitution, Part Time etc.
In the recent recruitment of Graduate Teachers too, only 31 percent reservation was provided to tribal candidates in total contrast to the agreement signed with ATSUM on September 20 this year.
According to the agreement, "wherever there is a backlog of ST reservation exceeding 50 percent of the vacancies taken together with the normal percentage of reservation of ST available in the current recruitment, the ST vacancies will be filled up to 50 percent of the advertised vacancies", mentioned the memorandum.
Apprising the Prime Minister of the general strike called with effect from the midnight January 3 till the midnight of the next day which would be followed by indefinite economic blockade on all the highways of the State, the student body appealed to the Prime Minister to intervene in the matter so that the grievances of the tribal peoples are addressed.
If no positive step is taken immediatelt, either from the State or the Centre side, we should not be blame if we declared Congress-led SPF Govt as anti-tribal, the student body added.