After an all-party meeting on Women’s Reservation Bill, the UPA government indicated it may convene a similar meeting over the Ranganath Mishra Commission report.
Towards the end of today’s meeting, CPI(M) leader Basudeb Acharia had raked up the topic of the Ranganath Mishra Commission report. Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee promptly said, the government can sit with various political parties to discuss the report.
But the Left demanded that the government table the Action Taken Report without any further delay before convening another all party meet on this issue.
While recommending 15 per cent quota for minorities, including 10 per cent for Muslims, the report also advocated grant of Scheduled Caste status to Dalits in all minority communities thereby seeking reservation for those Hindu Dalits, who converted to Islam and Christianity.
The government preferred “proper consideration” of the report before implementing it. The Ministry of Minority Affairs, headed by Salman Khurshid, has already come under pressure from various organisations to speed up the process.
