Patna: HAM(S) national president and state minor water resources minister Santosh Kumar Suman on Thursday demanded a review of the country’s reservation policy to assess which sections had benefited and which remained deprived even after 79 years of independence.Talking to this newspaper, Suman supported the sub-categorisation of SC/ST reservations. He said he was not against reservation but wanted either to increase it or make separate arrangements for sections still deprived of its benefits after seven decades.“How can it be wrong to ask which sections have benefited from reservation and to what extent and which people standing at the very bottom of the social ladder remain deprived of it? Why is no DM or SP from the Musahar community which has 4% population in Bihar? A comparative study is needed. Why will one section get 8% and another 80% among the beneficiaries?” he asked.The son of Union minister Jitan Ram Manjhi said Musahars still had a literacy rate of between 6% and 8%. He also questioned the absence of a common schooling system in the country.“I think the purpose of reservation has not been served. The concept of creating the Mahadalit category with 18 of the 22 Dalit caste groups has been defeated due to wide gap among the beneficiaries. The Extremely Backward Classes (EBC) category was created out of the other backward castes (OBCs) and the same was true for the concept of economically weaker sections (EWS) among the upper castes,” Suman said.The HAM(S) chief said if separate categories could be created within broader social classes to ensure benefits reached the truly deprived, there was no reason why sub-categorisation could not be considered within the Dalit community.Suman demanded a review of literacy, jobs and representation among different quota beneficiary groups in Bihar.
