MP Congress slams Centre over lateral entry move, wants it revoked

Bhopal, Aug 18 (PTI) The Congress in Madhya Pradesh on Sunday fumed at the Centre’s decision to recruit top public servants through lateral entry, terming the BJP an anti-reservation party, and sought its revocation.

The opposition party also attacked BJP’s ideological fountainhead RSS saying scrapping of reservation was at the top of its agenda.

The Congress attack came after it emerged that 45 specialists would soon join key posts of joint secretaries, directors and deputy secretaries in different central ministries.

Usually, such posts are manned by the officers of all-India services – the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Police Service (IPS) and Indian Forest Service (IFoS) – and Group A services, among others.

Taking to X, MP Congress chief Jitu Patwari called the BJP an anti-reservation party.

“It is also true that scraping reservation is at the top of the RSS’ agenda,” he said.

The Congress leader alleged that the NDA government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi keeps playing with the Constitution scripted by Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar and reservation.

“It keeps on apologising and repeating the (same) acts,” he alleged.

Patwari said it has become a habit of the BJP to make attempts to tweak the “fundamental right of reservation”.

“If this ordeal of neglect and insult to the exploited, oppressed and deprived classes has to end soon, then the roots of BJP will have to be attacked,” he wrote.

Dr Hiralal Alawa, Congress MLA from Monawar in Dhar district, also said that BJP plays with the Constitution and reservation.

Referring to an advertisement by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) for the lateral entries, he said it has no mention of reservation. What sort of jobs are these, asked Alawa, the national president of the tribal outfit Jai Adivasi Yuva Shakti (JAYS).

“If the Modi government does not revoke the ad, JAYS will launch a nationwide agitation to protect the fundamental rights of SC/ ST and OBC,” the ex-assistant professor and senior resident doctor of AIIMS, Delhi, said.

The UPSC on Saturday advertised 45 posts, 10 of joint secretaries and 35 of directors/deputy secretaries, to be filled through the lateral entry mode on a contract basis. It is the biggest tranche of lateral recruitment being undertaken by the Centre, an official said. PTI LAL NR