Four shortlisted for Karnataka Backward Classes panel

The government has begun preparations for a fresh socio-educational survey with chief minister Siddaramaiah shortlisting four new members to the Karnataka State Commission for Backward Classes.

"Four new members have been appointed to the commission — former IGP K Arkesh of Channapatna, lawyer Shivanna Gowda of Mysuru, assistant professor B Sumana of Mangaluru, and CM Kundagol, retired principal of Dharwad.". With these appointments, the panel is complete now under the chairmanship of Madhusudhan R Naik, a retired advocate-general who was named chairman in January," stated a senior government official close to the development. It was informed to the commission on Sunday.

"The commission will meet shortly and recommend to the government what to do on the proposed enumeration of the population," the official added.

The official added that the suggestions have been conveyed to the commission but the official orders are still awaited.

Though the commission can be assigned the task, the officials have spoken of the possibility of constituting a new committee for the purpose. Siddaramaiah has also requested his ministers to present their suggestions before deciding modalities.

Unlike the 2015 exercise that had a heavy dependence on schoolteachers and was delayed, the upcoming survey is likely to call on digital platforms to hasten data gathering, the official statement above stated.

Now that schools are in session, the government is weighing the possibility of using teachers after school hours and compensating them for their time, according to another official.

But the renewed drive for socio-educational survey has once again sparked opposition from dominant groups, such as Vokkaligas and Veerashaiva-Lingayats, who earlier criticized the Kantharaju report as biased and complained that it had underestimated their numbers.

On Sunday, the Samajika Nyaya Jagruthi Vedike cautioned the state against hastening into another survey. During a roundtable in Bengaluru, members raised questions about the necessity of a state-specific count when the Union government has already undertaken a commitment to a caste-based enumeration in the decadal census coming up.

Karnataka government has already lost 10 years in the guise of caste census. It was decided in the meeting to request the government not to waste the people's tax money and time on conducting another caste census," said Vishnukant Chatapalli, the representative of the forum.

He also added, "The caste census will be taken along with the population census by the central government. The caste census will incorporate social and educational details along with cultural information. The Centre will incur an expenditure of ₹13,000 crore for the same."

Contending that data collected by the Union alone would have constitutional validity, the forum called on the state to make the Kantharaju report public and desist from launching a parallel process. "If the state government does not stop conducting separate censuses of castes, legal recourse should be sought," Chatapalli said.

Blaming the government, BJP MLA V Sunil Kumar criticized the chief minister's changing stance on adopting the Hegde report.

Whatever pressure is exerted, we will not accept Jayaprakash Hegde's report. Chief minister Siddaramaiah has time and again stated that we will follow the recommendations of that report. But why did he back out after going to Delhi and coming back?" he questioned. "Whether or not the government accepts or puts into action the report is secondary. First, it should be made public for awareness.

Responding to these criticisms, Congress MLA Yathindra, Siddaramaiah’s son, blamed the previous governments for the delay in caste enumeration. “Had those administrations responded appropriately and moved forward with the earlier report, we wouldn’t be in a position where another survey is necessary,” he said, referring to the BJP and JD(S) governments’ inaction on the 2015 report.