Govt looks to bury Mishra panel’s report on converts

NEW DELHI: With the Ranganath Mishra commission report recommending SC status to Hindu converts to Christianity and Islam and a subquota for minorities in OBC reservations becoming a hot potato for UPA, the government is all set to give the controversial proposals a deep burial.

The government indicated as much with minority affairs minister Salman Khursheed ruling out an Action Taken Report (ATR) as the panel was not set up under the Commissions of Inquiry Act. Speculation had mounted after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told Lok Sabha that the report would be tabled in Parliament.

While the PM had spoken on the issue in response to a Samajwadi Party leader having raised the report in Lok Sabha on Wednesday, a more detailed examination of the commission's findings is currently under way. It is being felt the report deals with constitional issues that have been pronounced upon by courts and are not easy to deal with.

The view that the report is not only difficult to implement but can lead to a socially explosive situation is shared by the top Congress leadership. The party feels that the report will reopen quota controversies with a "communal" tinge and given BJP and Hindutva organisations like Vishwa Hindu Parishad a handle to get raise a divisive campaign.

The constitutional bar on Christian and Muslim "dalits" being allowed access to reservation is not easy to negotiate and any move to get Parliament to consider the potentially incendiary issue could trigger another quota war. Congress has not forgotten how former HRD minister Arjun Singh had ambushed UPA-1 with OBC quotas in central educational institutions.

The possibility of setting up a "committee on a committee" is an obvious option but it is being felt that it may not be feasible or wise to let the matter linger on and the government may well have to bite the bullet to close the chapter. A JD(U) MP who has been lobbying parties was bluntly told by a senior Congress leader that the report's recommendations were unlikely to be considered.

Further consultations between PMO and the ministry for minority affairs are on the cards after the PM returns from the climate summit at Copenhagen but the opinion in government and the Congress seems pretty much set against any move to not expand SC quotas which is also likely to run into the opposition of dalit groups who currently enjoy reservations. These SC groups have clearly indicated that they do not favour widening the quota ambit to other religious communities.