New Delhi | The Congress on Saturday slammed as "false propaganda" Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'snatching quotas' remarks and alleged that it was the BJP that was against reservation for SCs, STs and OBCs.
Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said the reality is that since 1950, reservation in education and employment has been possible when there have been Congress prime ministers and Congress governments at the helm.
In a video statement, Ramesh said, "The prime minister is repeatedly indulging in the false propaganda that the Congress is against the reservation for SCs, STs and OBCs and wants to snatch it away. This is absolutely false." "The reality is that the provisions in the Constitution for reservation for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes were made because of B R Ambedkar, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and other Congress leaders. So, this was the contribution of the Congress," Ramesh said.
He said in 1994 when P V Narasimha Rao was the prime minister, for the first time, 27 per cent reservation for OBCs was given in employment in central government and in 2006 when Manmohan Singh was the prime minister, 27 per cent reservation was made in higher education institutions for OBCs.
"So, the reality is that since 1950, reservation in education and employment for SCs, STs and OBCs, has been possible when there have been Congress prime ministers and Congress governments," he said.
A few months ago, when the women's reservation bill was being debated, the Congress demanded that OBC women should also be given that reservation but the central government did not accept it and the PM did not say anything about it, Ramesh said.
"A new law came into being in which there is no provision for OBC women. So the reality is that the BJP is against the reservation for SCs, STs and OBCs. It has been due to the guarantee of the Congress that the reservation for SCs, STs and OBCs in education and employment is still available," the Congress leader said.
Modi, who addressed election rallies in Araria and Munger Lok Sabha constituencies in Bihar on Friday, charged the opposition with trying to "steal" reservations meant for OBCs, SCs and STs "for the sake of their favourite vote bank of Muslims".
Modi on Thursday said the opposition parties wanted to win the Lok Sabha elections to bring religion-based reservation while he sought 400 seats to stop them from snatching the quotas of Dalits and Other Backward Classes.
At election rallies in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, he also pitched himself as the 'chowkidar' (watchman) and a wall to protect people from alleged Congress plans to rob people either through redistribution of wealth or imposition of an inheritance tax if the INDIA bloc came to power.