BJP WILL REVOKE MUSLIM QUOTA IN TELANGANA: SHAH
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will end reservation for Muslims introduced by the Congress and the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) in Telangana and provide the benefit to Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs) and Other Backward Classes (OBCs), if it wins the Lok Sabha elections in the southern state, Union home minister Amit Shah said on Thursday.
“The BJP has decided that they will end reservation for Muslims done by Congress and BRS in Telangana and make reservations for SCs, STs and OBCs,” he said at an election rally in the state’s Siddipet Lok Sabha constituency.
Shah’s remarks came a month after Telangana chief minister A Revanth Reddy said that the ruling Congress in the state would protect the 4% reservation for Muslims in education and employment. On March 15, Reddy said: “Neither Shah nor Prime Minister Narendra Modi can scrap the 4% Muslim quota started by the then Congress CM, the late YS Rajasekhara Reddy, in the undivided state.”
The former BRS government in the state had also refused to do away with the reservation amid criticisms from the BJP. “The 4% Muslim reservation is not on the basis of religion. That is on the basis of socio-economic status,” then state minister KT Rama Rao said in November.
During his address to the crowd, Shah also alleged that the Congress had made Telanagana the state’’s ‘Delhi ATM’ within a short span of coming to power.
“In such a short time, the Congress party has made Telangana ‘Delhi’s ATM’. The Congress party is not investigating the corruption of BRS, whether it is Kaleshwaram (project) or land scam. BRS and Congress party, both are in cahoots. You make (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi ji PM for third term, Narendra Modi ji will liberate Telangana from this corruption,” he added.