Vijayawada: Congress demands 10% quota for EWS in government jobs

Vijayawada: Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee on Friday demanded the State government to immediately issue orders for reserving 10 per cent of government jobs for the Economically Weaker Sections (EWS).

APCC working president Dr N Tulasi Reddy said in a statement that the youth belonging to upper castes have already lost 26,807 jobs as village/ward volunteers and 12,859 jobs in the village/ward secretariats in the absence of reservations.

He said that the Central government and State governments including the neighbouring Telangana are also implementing the EWS reservations. He wondered as to why the State government is not implementing the 10 per cent reservations for the EWS as per the 103 Amendment to the Constitution.

Tulasi Reddy said that EWS reservation is not an alm but a constitutional right. He pointed out that there were poor people among Brahmana, Kshatriya, Vysya, Reddy, Kamma, Kapu, Balija, Telaga, Ontari, Velama, Syed, Moghul, Pathan and other castes also.

He deplored that the poor young people belonging to upper castes have already lost 60,376 jobs due to the inaction of the state government. He demanded the government to issue orders giving 10 per cent reservations to the EWS youth before they launched an agitation.

Meanwhile, the City Congress president Naraharisetti Narasimha Rao, along with Congress leaders Joseph, Suryaprakash and others submitted a memorandum to Municipal Commissioner Prasanna Venkatesh appealing him to reconsider the imposition of the proposed new property tax, garbage tax, drainage tax and water charges.