Gujarat govt announces 27% reservation for OBCs in local self-governing bodies

Prior to the 27 per cent quota move, the OBC communities were getting 10 per cent reservation in the local bodies. Due to the non-appointment of a dedicated commission to fix the OBC reservations in the local bodies, and later the non-implementation of the Jhaveri Commission report, elections to thousands of local bodies in the state were postponed by the Gujarat State Election Commission. The polls will now be possible.

The polls will be held soon, assured Rushikesh Patel. In all, elections of two district panchayats, 17 taluka panchayats, 74 nagarpalikas, and 6,000 gram panchayats are pending.

Led by Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel, the state cabinet took the decision on reservations on Tuesday on the basis of the report by the dedicated panel headed by retired High Court judge K S Jhaveri. The panel was formed to decide on the OBC reservation in local bodies of the state like gram panchayats, taluka panchayats, district panchayats, municipalities, and municipal corporations. The cabinet took the decision while accepting a report of a cabinet sub-committee that was formed to study the recommendations of the Jhaveri Commission.

The sub-committee was headed by Rushikesh Patel and it had seven other state ministers as members.

The Minister said, “As per the directions of the Supreme Court, the state government had formed the Justice Jhaveri Commission to fix reservations in seats and in chairpersons of local bodies for OBC communities. This Commission had submitted its report. To study the report, the state government had formed a cabinet sub-committee. The state government has accepted the recommendations of the cabinet sub-committee in public interest.”

Rushikesh Patel said that it has been decided to fix a ‘flat’ 27 per cent reservation for OBC communities in elections of local bodies. He added that the reservation has been fixed in such a manner that the total reservation (of SC/ST/OBC communities) does not pass the 50 per cent limit.

The cabinet sub-committee agreed with the Commission that recommended not to change the current reservation for SC/ST communities, he further added.

According to the Minister, as per the recommendations of the Commission, in the areas where the population of SC/ST community is above 50 per cent, the OBC communities are not eligible to get any reservation. “However, in those areas, we continue the 10 per cent reservation (for OBC communities),” he added. There are nine districts and 51 talukas where this provision will be applied, he further added.

Giving details on the increase in the number of reserved seats for OBC in elections of local bodies, the Minister said that earlier in 33 district panchayats, the total reserved seats for OBC were 105 out of 1,090. The number has now gone up to 229.

Similarly, the total reserved seats for OBCs in 248 taluka panchayats were 506 out of 5,202. The figure has now gone up to 1,085.

Earlier, out of the total 1.26 lakh seats in 14,562 gram panchayats in the state, the reserved seats for the OBCs were 12,750. Now, with the new move, the figure has gone up to 25,347.

Eight municipal corporations have a total of 680 seats. Earlier, the reserved seats for OBC were 67. The number of reserved seats now stand at 183.

The Jhaveri Commission was appointed by the Gujarat government in July last year to make recommendations to the state government to fix the reservation quota in the election of local bodies. It had submitted its report to the state government in April.

As per an official release, based on various data, the Commission has estimated the total average population of OBC communities in Gujarat at 49.20 per cent (52 per cent in rural areas and 46.43 per cent in urban areas).