Sachar: Govt to set up two expert groups

The specific projects include augmenting the entrepreneurial skills of the minorities, development of Wakf properties and putting in place a data bank on the minorities, enabling the Government to form particular schemes for them.

The terms of reference of this expert group will be to recommend the structure, scope and functions of the proposed Equal Opportunity Commission, to advise on an appropriate legislative framework for such a Commission and to make any other recommendations relevant to the above.

The group, headed by N R Madhava Menon, will include Javeed Alam, Satish Deshpande, Yogendra Yadav and Gopal Guru as its members. The Commission is expected to be political in nature and will address the issues of discrimination against the Muslims in the Government as well as private sector.

The expert group on 8220;diversity index8221; will 8220;develop and devise an acceptable index to measure diversity in the areas of education, Government and private employment and housing,8221; as suggested by the Sachar Committee. It will be headed by Amitabh Kundu and would include Sugata Marjit, Abdul Kalam and Hasb Dabru as its members.

The plans in the pipeline include the development of Wakf Properties, tapping its commercial potential. The Union Minority Affairs Ministry has already written to the state Governments about the same. The Government is also exploring ways to amend the Wakf Act so that the management of the properties is done in a better way with the Centre having a greater say.

The skill and entrepreneurship development among the Muslim community will focus on making credit easy to the Muslims, besides devising particular schemes in areas where the Muslims are employed in traditional occupations like the lock industry in Aligarh.

Meanwhile, the Centre has written to state Governments and Union Territories, urging them to post more Muslim health workers, teachers and police personnel in areas dominated by the community.

The letter, sent by the Department of Personnel and Training DoPT on August 30, has focused on these spheres of Government since these are the ones which have 8220;maximum public-administration interface8221; and the maximum potential to generate confidence within the community, official sources said.

The department, however, admitted that the letter was more in the nature of an 8220;advisory8221; since posting of personnel came under the domain of the state Governments. 8220;Our letter has nothing to do with recruitment, only posting of existing personnel in the states,8221; a senior DoPT official said.

The Union Ministries of Home, Health and HRD have been directed to come up with guidelines for such postings. The Home Ministry is the cadre controlling authority for the Indian Police Service but officials concede that the right to post a particular officer to a particular area is the prerogative of the state Government.