-PTI   At a time when the issue of quota for backward class Muslims has stirred a political controversy, National Minority Commission chief Wajahat Habibullah has made a strong plea for granting Scheduled Caste status to Muslim and Christian dalits to get them reservation benefits.  Referring to the Constitution Order of 1950 that asks for inclusion of those dalits, who converted to Buddhism and Sikhism in the SC category, Habibullah said, "Our case...

-The Hindu   ‘The 50 per cent limit on reservation set by the Supreme Court should be challenged' Scholar of the Dalit movement Gail Omvedt supported reservation for minorities, but said the allocation should not be carved out of the existing quota for Other Backward Classes (OBCs), but added to it by increasing the percentage of reservation. Addressing a large gathering of people attending the 10th anniversary of the Bahujan Vidyarthi Sangha (BVS), Ms....

-DNA   Baba Ramdev was not there. Nor was it the Ramlila Maidan of Delhi. But lathis were used - on the dalits of Sanand, who had experienced a similar fate when they were lathi-charged post midnight earlier this week, and the corpse which was placed in the police station to agitate against the ineffective cops, was seized. The body was of Atul Rathod, a resident of Rethal village of Sanand Taluka. The...

-The Indian Express   Six dalits were thrashed by three members of another community in Rethal village, about 20 kilometres from Sanand town, on Tuesday night following which one of them died in the hospital. Three others are said to be critical while one has sustained minor injuries. The reason, police said, is the two FIRs they had lodged against one Yuvrajsinh for allegedly beating up a Dalit auto-driver. According to villagers, three persons...

Muslims, SCs, STs reflect better social indices, closer to national averages Early in the morning, Mohammad Nadeem, a 25-year-old ‘pakka adati’, big wholesaler, at one of Muzaffarnagar’s fruit and vegetable mandis, briskly sets about selling carrots and oranges. As he expertly sifts through sacks of fresh produce, it’s difficult to picture him hawking peanuts by the roadside. But for five years in this bustling western Uttar Pradesh mandi, Nadeem’s store...