Siyasi Muslims by Hilal Ahmed

Author:Hilal Ahmed
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
ISBN: 9789353055127
Publisher: Penguin Random House India Private Limited
Published: 2019-04-25T04:00:00+00:00

The 1988 Jamia Act tells us that Jamia is open to all and it is bound to follow the reservation policy of the government of India. The NCMEI judgement, however, gives a different interpretation. It recognizes Jamia as a Muslim minority institution. Since the 93rd Constitution Amendment Act ensures that minority institutions are exempted from following the national reservation policy, it becomes possible for Jamia to provide reservation to Muslims.

Muslims in the Jamia case are interpreted as national minorities by relying entirely on the principle of cultural distinctiveness. It simply means that the principle of backwardness is not considered applicable to minority-run institutions. In other words, the subgrouping of national minorities—with regard to socio-economic backwardness proposed by the Sachar Committee and the Ranganath Misra Commission—is not taken into consideration.

This poses an apparent contradiction. On the one hand, there is a demand to expand the scope of the SC category so that Muslims and Christians Dalits may get the benefit of reservation. On the other hand, there is no reservation for Muslims Dalits and Christian Dalits in the Muslim and Christian minority-run institutions such as Jamia and St Stephens.16

It is apparent that defining a religious minority at the national level is an unsettled issue. The judiciary as well as the Parliament must offer a solution to the tension between the principle of distinctiveness and the principle of backwardness.

The minority status of Muslims of India has now become a highly contested issue—not merely for the Muslims but also for all those who believe in the political morality envisaged by the Constitution of India.

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