Kerala govt finally decides to issue minority certificates

Thiruvananthapuram: The Supreme Court is yet to decide on 4.5 percent sub quota for Minorities under the 27 percent OBC quota in the central educational institutions and jobs. The minorities, chiefly Muslims in Kerala were fortunate enough to overcome a major hurdle in their way to obtain the sub quota reservations as the Kerala Revenue Department finally decided to issue separate minority certificates according to a format suggested by the Kerala Minority Welfare Department [MWD].

The minority students from Kerala appearing for IIT, IIM exams last April had encountered difficulties in applying for this reservation benefits because the state only had a creamy layer, nativity or community certificate to be sent in along with their applications. None among these were quite adequate an evidence before the central govt institutions to prove that they belonged to a minority community of the state because, according to the 1992 National Commission for Minorities act, section 2C - the notified minority communities of a particular state like the Christians, Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists and Parsees should submit a minority certificate issued by the state govt in specific to obtain special reservation benefits in the central govt jobs and institutions.

Though the Minority Welfare Department of Kerala under its director Dr P Nazeer was pressing on the necessity of formatting such a certificate to help out the minority job aspirants and students, it often went off as an unheard call. He contacted all 14 District collectors of the state with this demand by sending in them copies of the 1992 Minority Act, but they replied saying that it is just an Act and it requires a further notification to process. He immediately took care to send in the 1993 notification of this act to all these District Collectors and Tahsildars.

Dr P Nazeer prepared the format for the certificate in his own laptop and luckily the Revenue Department of the state with the consent of the Revenue Secretary has sent in the orders to the District Collectors, Land Revenue Departments, and Tahsildars, along with an approval from State Minority Secretary to issue minority certificates to those belonging to the minority communities of the state. The order has been passed and the certificate format too has been finalised according to the suggestions of the MWD.

This has been a major step towards the emancipation of these marginalised sections of the state because until now though the Centre was seen announcing reservations for the minorities there was no specific system to make it available to the minority communities of the state, because Kerala is yet to have a minority act of its own and the state was not issuing any certificate in specific to prove that these sections belonged to a minority community.