Double standard in Medical PG admission: Government sabotages backward reservation

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: State government denies 30 percent reservation to backward communities in state medical and dental PG admission.

Rajan Khobragade, Principal Secretary, Department of Health, yesterday issued an illegal and ridiculous order that the existing nine percent reservation could not be increased as there were not enough seats available for PGs. At the same time, the forward reservation will remain at 10 percent.

The Supreme Court had ordered 27 percent reservation in government appointments and admission in educational institutions for backward communities. One week ago, the central government had ordered a 27 percent reservation for OBCs in all-India medical, dental degree, and PG admissions from this year. The Backward Classes Commission also recommended that the existing 30 percent reservation in state medical degree courses should be extended to PG courses as well. The Left Front government accepted the stand of the top officials of the health and medical education department to ignore all this.

Earlier, 31 percent of the medical PG reserved seats were slashed in the name of service quota and 9 percent reservation was earlier given to the backward classes without any criteria commensurate with the population. (Ezhava-3, Muslim-2, Other Backward Hindu-1, Latin-SIUC-1, Other Backward Christian-1, Kudumbi-1). The unauthorized service quota was later canceled. However, shortly after the central government decided to set aside a 10 percent quota for economically backward in the general category, it was also applied in the state medical PG last year. With this, forward communities got more reserved seats than backward communities.

Two backward medical students approached the High Court after this injustice was brought out by 'Kerala Kaumudi'. On December 7, 2020, the High Court directed the state government to take an appropriate decision within four months.

While replying to Ahmed Kabir's submission to the Assembly, former minister KT Jaleel had said that an order would be issued soon on the basis of the report of the Backward Classes Commission.

Strange arguments of the government

The order issued by the Principal Secretary of Health stated that the service quota will be reinstated in Medical PG in the future and that raising the backward reservation from nine to more than 50% of the total reservation would be contrary to the Supreme Court decision. The government has not decided to reinstate the suspended service quota.

While 50% of PSC appointments have backward-scheduled category reservations, only 10 percent of the merit quota has been applied for forward reservation. The state government did not see any violation of the Supreme Court judgment in this.