IMPHAL, August 4: The Manipur University Scheduled Caste and Other Backwards Caste Students’ Union has closed the MU Gate from 1 pm onwards after organising a protest demonstration against the implementation of the Central Education Institutions (Reservation in Admission) Amendment Act, 2012 from the 2014 academic session.
The students locked down the main entrance gate of MU and staged a sit-in protest near the gate.
Later, representatives of the students’ union submitted a memorandum to the MU Vice-Chancellor.
At the sidelines of the protest demonstration, the general secretary of MU SC and OBC Students’ Union, Rajeev told media persons that their main demand was for the MU authorities to refrain from implementing the Central Education Institutions (Reservations in Admission) Amendment Act, 2012.
Rajeev said that the Act increases the reservations for ST students during the admissions which till 2013 have remained at 7.5 percent for ST students, 25 percent for OBC students and 15 percent for SC students.
Stating that after the implementation of the Central Education Institutions (Reservations in Admission) Amendment Act, 2012, the reservations for SC students are deducted to 13 percent, OBC to 17 percent while the reservations for ST students have increased to 31 percent, he added that the amendment is applicable to all North-Eastern states, but Assam is considered separately on the basis of only some parts of Assam being tribal areas.
Besides, Assam is included in the Sixth Schedule along with Meghalaya, Nagaland, Tripura and Mizoram. But Manipur is not included in the Sixth Schedule, Rajeev said.
Questioning the rationale of Manipur being included in the tribal habited area only and though not in the Sixth Schedule, he said the authority of MU has announced recently to implement the Central Education Institutions Amendment Act, 2012 from this year and has already declared to have an entrance test after implementing the provisions of the new Amendment Act.
The VC has not responded positively to our memorandum, Rajeev said, adding that as a result they have sent letters to various Head of Departments and Deans to not conduct the entrance examination as of now.
If the entrance test is conducted by any department, they will be responsible for any untoward incident happening thereafter, he warned.
