PMK leader urges students to call off stir, supports reservation

Hyderabad, May 25 (UNI) Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) founder president S Ramadoss today urged the striking students to call off their agaitation against reservations for OBCs in the interest of the nation.

Dr Ramadoss, who is in the city along with PMK Parliamentary Party leader Prof M Ramadass and former Bihar MP Ram Avdesh Singh to garner support for the cause of OBC reservation, told the media that for the last 51 years, OBCs have been deprived of a benefit which was constitutionally guaranteed to them.

He said the UPA government at the Centre which had passed the 93rd amendment in Parliament in December last year, and unanimously supported by all political parties it had become an Act in January 2006.

On this basis the government was now trying to provide 27 per cent reservation in educational institutions. Every right thinking person should support it, he added.

He urged the media to project the cause of social justice in an objective and non-partisan manner.

As a member of the UPA alliance, the PMK attended the UPA-Left Coordination Committee meeting at Delhi on May 23, and strongly urged the government to implement the reservation policy through an ordinance. ''The UPA is of the view that in the Monsoon session of Parliament a legislation will be passed with respect to OBC reservations,'' Dr Ramadoss said.

Asked if merit would be affected due to OBC reservations, the PMK leader denied the claim and said all these years reservations were in vogue for SCs and STs and nowhere merit was affected. In future also it will not be affected, he added.

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