States too can declare religious or linguistic community including Hindus as minority: Centre to SC
India Today
The Centre told the Supreme Court that state governments can declare any religious or linguistic community, including Hindus, as a minority within the said state.
State governments can declare any religious or linguistic community, including Hindus, as a minority within the said state, the Centre has told the Supreme Court.
The submission was made in response to a plea filed by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay that sought directions for framing of guidelines identifying minorities at the state level contending that Hindus are in a minority in 10 states and are not able to avail the benefits of schemes meant for minorities.
The Ministry of Minority Affairs submitted that matters concerning whether followers of Hinduism, Judaism, Bahaism can establish and administer educational institutions of their choice in the said states and those related to their identification as minority within the state may be considered at state level.
Upadhyay had challenged the validity of section 2(f) of the National Commission for Minority Education Institution Act, 2004 alleging that it gives unbridled power to the Centre and termed it “manifestly arbitrary, irrational, and offending”.
Section 2(f) of NCMEI Act empowers the Centre to identify and notify minority communities in India.
The Ministry of Minority Affairs in its response said: “It is submitted that the State governments can also declare a religious or linguistic community as a minority community within the said state.” “For instance, the Maharashtra government has notified ‘Jews’ as a minority community within the state. Moreover, the Karnataka government has notified Urdu, Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, Marathi, Tulu, Lamani, Hindi, Konkani and Gujarati languages as minority languages within the state of Karnataka,” it said.
“Therefore in view of the states also notifying minority communities, the petitioners’ allegation that the followers of Judaism, Bahaism, and Hinduism, who are real minorities in Ladakh, Mizoram, Lakshadweep, Kashmir, Nagaland, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Punjab, and Manipur cannot establish and administer educational institutions of their choice is not correct.” The affidavit said that the Parliament has enacted the National Commission for Minorities Act, 1992, under Article 246 of the Constitution read with Entry 20 in the Concurrent List in Schedule 7.
