Mallikarjun Kharge said that there are about 24 lakh vacancies in government agencies. He said this in response to Union minister Nitin Gadkari’s statement that reservation will not guarantee employment as jobs are shrinking. Kharge said that first these 24 lakh vacancies should be filled.
Earlier Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Saturday had said that reservation will not guarantee employment as jobs are shrinking, adding that there is a “school of thought” which wants policy-makers to consider the poorest of poor in every community.
Gadkari made the statement in Aurangabad, Maharashtra on questioned over ongoing Maratha agitation for reservation.
“Let’s us assume that reservation is given. But there are no jobs. In banks, the jobs have shrunk because of IT. Government recruitment is frozen. Where are the jobs? The problem with quota is that ‘backwardness’ is becoming political. Everyone says ‘I am backward’. In Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, Brahmins are strong. They dominate politics. (And) They say they are backward,” the minister said.
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The senior BJP leader spoke about the “school of thought” which regarded that a poor person “has no caste, creed or language,” while another “school of thought” implored that the poorest of the poor must be considered in every community. He said, “So one school of thought is that a poor person is a poor person, he has no caste, creed or language. Whatever may be the religion — the Muslim, the Hindu or the Maratha (a caste), in all communities there is one section which has no clothes to wear, no food to eat.”
