BJP slams Congress for blocking OBC bill

Bhubaneswar, April 16 (IANS) Coming down heavily on the Congress and other opposition parties for blocking in the Rajya Sabha a bill to grant constitutional status to the OBC Commission, the BJP on Sunday accused them of depriving the poor of their benefits.

The Bharatiya Janata Party, at its two-day National Executive meeting here, passed a special resolution condemning the blocking and hailed Prime Minister Narendra Modi for granting constitutional status to the bill.

"Today, when the BJP government led by Modi has taken this step to bring in equality in the society, the Congress and other regional parties are disappointed and their frustration is obvious," Human Resource and Development Minister Prakash Javadekar told the media.

"These parties have always suppressed the interests of the backward classes of the society and only given them false hopes."

He said the manner in which the bill was opposed in the Rajya Sabha exposed the real attitude towards backward classes.

"It is evident that despite being in power for so long, the Congress did not initiate any concrete step towards fulfilling interests of backward classes. Now when the BJP has got the mandate to rule the country, the government has achieved the goals by handling these issues on priority," the minister added.

The resolution alleged that despite the suggestions of Kaka Kalelkar Commission (1950) and Mandal Commission (1979), the Congress governments did not take any action in this direction.

"It is known that the OBC Parliamentary Committee made a recommendation in this regard and the MPs from all parties had personally requested the Prime Minister to amend the Constitution in this regard. Considering these suggestions, the BJP-led government took strong steps and was successful in bringing consensus on the issue in the Lok Sabha," the resolution read.

The resolution was moved by BJP's OBC MP Hukumdev Narayan Yadav and was seconded by Chief Ministers like Raghubar Das of Jharkhand and Shivraj Singh Chouhan of Madhya Pradesh.

Javadekar, however, hoped that collective wisdom would prevail and the bill would be passed in the months to come.

"This issue is directly linked with the interests of backward classes, so it needs to be supported by every single political party."

The BJP also called on all party workers and every social institution to make people aware of the historic step and ensure equal opportunities to the people of backward classes.

"It is a noble step taken by Modi towards creating an egalitarian society. It is the duty of every leader of the party to reach this message to the remote parts of the country," the resolution said.

"It is after 70 years of India's independence, a government has taken this historic decision aimed at fulfilling the interests of the poor who have been living in remote areas without any basic facilities.

"It is indeed a very important step forward that will help improve the living conditions of the poor and bring them in the mainstream. This is fulfilment of the long pending demand of providing social justice to the backward classes," it added.