Christian and Muslim leaders meet Home Minister on SC status
ICC Note
“For more than five decades Muslims and Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin are being excluded from the process of development. Such an exclusion of a section of the people goes against the “inclusive growth” repeatedly invoked by the Union Government,”
By John Malhotra
01/21/2010 India (Christian Today India)-A delegation of Christian and Muslim leaders on Wednesday met the Home Minister of India P. Chidambaram and urged the implementation of Ranganath Mishra Commission report that recommends extending SC status to all Dalits regardless of religion.
A memorandum was submitted calling for the deletion of para 3 of Constitutional Order 1950 which originally restricted the Scheduled Castes net to the Hindus and later opened it to Sikhs and Buddhists, but still excluding from its purview the Muslims and Christians.
“For more than five decades Muslims and Christians of Scheduled Caste Origin are being excluded from the process of development. Such an exclusion of a section of the people goes against the “inclusive growth” repeatedly invoked by the Union Government,” they informed.
“Based only on the descriptive and statistical evidence available, there is a strong case for including Dalit Muslims and Dalit Christians in the Scheduled Caste category,” it said. “There are compelling arguments in favour of such an inclusion based on principles of natural justice and fairness.”
