Bihar caste survey has issues that need to be resolved: Shah; Nitish seeks special status to state

PATNA: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday said there are some issues regarding the caste survey conducted by the Bihar government, which he hoped that the state will resolve.

Addressing the 26th Eastern Zonal Council meeting here in presence of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Shah said the central government never had any intention of creating hurdles in the caste-based survey.

Kumar raised before Shah his long-standing demand for grant of special category status to the state.

The chief minister also hoped that the Centre would consider the request for placing in the ninth schedule of the Constitution the state’s recent legislations by which quotas for deprived castes were raised from 50 per cent to 65 per cent.

Following a caste survey in Bihar, the Nitish Kumar administration hiked reservations for deprived castes from 50 to 65 per cent in state government jobs and educational institutions and urged the Centre to incorporate the increased quota in the 9th schedule of the Constitution.

The Ninth Schedule of the Constitution includes a list of Central and state laws that cannot be challenged in courts. In 1992, the Supreme Court capped reservations for the backward classes at 50 per cent.

According to a statement issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs, Shah said at the meeting that when his party was in power in the state, it had supported the caste-based survey.

"There are some issues regarding the caste survey, which he (Shah) hoped that the state government would resolve," the statement said, without elaborating.

Addressing the meeting that lasted for about three hours, the union home minister said that 1,157 issues have been resolved in the meetings of the zonal councils.

Shah said that in the zonal council meetings, differences on political matters should be avoided and efforts should be made to resolve issues in a liberal manner.

It is the first time that Shah and Kumar shared a dais in Bihar after the JD(U) dumped the BJP in August 2022 to form the Grand Alliance government in the state.

In his address, Kumar "urged the Centre to accord special status to Bihar in the meeting. Bihar has been raising the issue of Special status to the state since 2010. The fresh demand was necessitated by findings of the caste survey carried out by the 'grand alliance' government in the state," a CMO statement said.

The state government has planned to undertake several welfare measures for deprived families, he said adding that the implementation of all such measures will incur an expenditure of Rs 2.50 lakh crore.

The meeting was also attended by senior ministers from Odisha, West Bengal, Bihar and Jharkhand -- other member states of the Eastern Zonal Council.

Five Zonal Councils (Western, Eastern, Northern, Southern and Central) were set up under the States Reorganization Act, 1956 to foster Inter-State cooperation and co-ordination among the states.

They are mandated to discuss and make recommendations on any matter of common interest in the field of economic and social planning, border disputes, linguistic minorities or inter-state transport.