AIOBCSA writes to President Droupadi Murmu on non-implementation of faculty reservation by IITs, MoE

NEW DELHI : The All India OBC Students’ Association (AIOBCSA) has urged President Droupadi Murmu to direct the education ministry officials to issue guidelines to all the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) to fix the number of each cadre of teaching posts for direct recruitment and to upload the updated faculty reservation rosters with the summary of backlog of SC, ST, OBC in each cadre on their official websites.

The students’ association wrote a letter to President Murmu about the non-implementation of reservation policy by the IITs and the ministry of education. “As you are aware that as per the Central Educational Institutions (Reservations in Teachers Cadre) Act-2019, the SC/ST/OBC reservation applies to the sanctioned strength in each cadre of the teaching posts (professor, associate professor, and assistant professor) in IITs which is effective since March 7, 2019,” said AIOBCSA in the letter.

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The students’ body argued that the IITs have done nothing to implement the faculty reservation “in letter and spirit” even after various instructions issued by the education ministry in the last three and a half years.

AIOBCSA pointed out towards the following “anti-reservation acts” of the IITs:

• As per MoE’s reply in Lok Sabha on December 19, 2022, none of the IITs have fixed the number of posts reserved for SC, ST, OBC in each cadre of teaching posts. As a result, IITs have failed in determining the actual share, backlog and short fall of SC, ST, OBC in such posts. The performance of IITs is also very poor in mission mode drive for filling the faculty posts reserved for SC, ST, and OBCs.
• IITs are taking shelter of the executive instructions of the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) letter dated May 8, 2008 which is irrelevant and legally invalid in view of Section 3 of CEI act to justify the flexible cadre. “It is very unfortunate that executive provisions are overring on the provisions of a Parliament Act. This act of IITs is a gross dishonour of our Parliament,” it said.
• Recently, in the matter of Sachchidanand Pandey vs Union of India, the Supreme Court directed MoE and IITs to follow the faculty reservation as per the CEI act. The IITs and MoE have not taken any action regarding this.

AIOBCSA finally urged President Droupdadi Murmu to look into the matter personally and take action to protect the rights of SC, ST, and OBCs.