Govt should amend Constitution to bring reservation out of judiciary's ambit: Ram Vilas Paswan

NEW DELHI: Union minister and Lok Janshakti Party chief Ram Vilas Paswan said 73 Members of Parliament belonging to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes unanimously want a “permanent solution” to end the court’s interference in matters of reservation by way of the government amending the Constitution.
Paswan told ET that the government should bring a bill when Parliament reopens to enact a law which specifies that all Acts pertaining to “reservation should be put in the ninth schedule of Constitution so that it (reservation) goes out of the court’s jurisdiction”. He said this was the demand of the SC/ST MPs he had recently hosted at his residence.

The food and public distribution minister also said that the matter of an Indian Judicial Service (IJS) “is moving ahead now and the government is positively regarding this”. “The collegium system is not transparent and judges need to be chosen from all sections through competition in IJS. A public representative makes laws but those laws get stuck in the court. Hence, IJS is a must,” said Paswan.

The minister said the government was looking at “going for the best option” regarding tackling the recent judgement of the Supreme Court, which said reservation is not a fundamental right, and that his party was also seeking legal opinion on whether to file a review petition against the judgement. “This judgement is against the SC/ST interests. We had filed a review petition last time against the SC judgement that diluted the SC/ST Act,” he said.

Paswan also said that the reservation in jobs and education provided by Bhim Rao Ambedkar in the Constitution was “permanent” and without any time limit. “Many spread this falsehood that reservation was meant only for 10 years. That pertained to only political reservation,” he said.

Speaking on the Bihar assembly election, which is due in October, Paswan described the opposition in the state as a “sunk boat” owing to “bitter three-way infighting” in the RJD family, whose head Lalu Prasad is in jail. “Even if (Prasad) gets bail, it will be on some grounds and he cannot do political campaigning – the Election Commission will keep a watch on that,” said Paswan, whose party is part of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance.

Paswan blamed the Delhi assembly polls loss on the “BJP not focusing enough on local issues of development, not having a CM face and irresponsible statements of some leaders”. A state election should not be fought on national issues and certain statements of BJP leaders worked negatively, he said. “There is a message therein for Bihar election that we need to keep a control over our statements,” he said.