BHOPAL: In its interim order, the Jabalpur bench of Madhya Pradesh High Court on Tuesday permitted the state government to conduct medical officer recruitment through MP Public Service Commission (MPPSC) with 14 per reservation maintaining the ban on 27 per cent OBC quota in Madhya Pradesh.
Advocate General Purshendra Kaurav said, “High Court does not have any objection as far as 14 per cent OBC reservation is concerned; the contention is on raising it to 27 per cent. Thus the court has permitted the state government to go ahead with the recruitment of medical officers with 14 per cent reservation.” The matter of 27 per cent reservation will be taken up in the next hearing, said Kaurav.
On March 8, 2019, the government passed an ordinance to increase the reservation, taking the cumulative quota in government jobs and educational institutions to 63 per cent – 16 % SC, 20 % ST and 27 % for the OBCs. Later, the government extended a 10 per cent reservation to the economically weaker sections.
The high court was hearing petitions filed around two years ago after the then Congress government, headed by Kamal Nath, had enhanced reservation percentage for OBCs in March 2019. The petitioners, citing the Supreme Court observation, had stated that the reservation in government jobs and educational institutions cannot exceed 50 per cent.
The petitions read that OBC accounts for 51 per cent of the state population and if the government takes into account the OBCs, STs and SCs, which constitutes around 87 per cent of the total population, it can easily justify its quota up to 87 per cent. However, will that be justice to the people of other segments of society?
